


Afterlife

by Left_Handed_Rick



Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: Addiction, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Because science, Dacryphilia, Depression, Detox, Existential Dread, F/M, Grief & Loss, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mentions of past sexual child abuse and forced drug usage (Rick), Multi, Other, PTSD, Prostitution, Punk Kids in Later Chapters, Redemption, Rick is IC, Science Kink, Self-Harm (Morty), Sensory kink, Slice of Life, Starry Citadel AU, Substance Abuse, Suicide, Suicide Attempts, Theoretical Soulmates, Time Travel AU, Time travel in the R&M universe is always a cosmic horror mindfuck, Underage Smoking, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unreliable narrators that romanticize unhealthy shit from time to time, Whiplash, attempted drug overdose, bilingual rick, dark themes, demisexual, flirting with cosmological concepts using known science, granddaddy issues, mentions of sexual assault (Rick), morty is smart, radio ex machina
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2018-03-23
Packaged: 2019-02-22 10:12:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 47,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13164759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Left_Handed_Rick/pseuds/Left_Handed_Rick
Summary: The only kind of afterlife that exists, Morty, is the kind you'd create for yourself.Morty Smith decides to abandon his timeline and catch a one-way ticket 55 years into the past (1971) with plans to meet up with 24-year-old Rick Sanchez, and give them both a shot at the life neither of them had the chance to experience together.He wanted a fresh start, but Morty hadn’t fully understood that he was also condemning the both of them to live it. A story about two self-hating headcases as they learn how to put in the work it takes to love each other, despite the mental-health and trauma struggles each of them brings to the relationship. Not so much a timetravel story, as it is a story about time relentlessly moving forward, even when you can go back.Emotional whiplash, and slow burn slice of life dealing with complex characters - all wrapped up in my nerdy af science, cosmology, phillosophy, math, and music headcannons (linked in extensive endnotes). See author notes for individual chapter links/warnings/tags. Updates slow cause of angst.





	1. Shoegazing & Stargazing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Squikkums](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Squikkums/gifts).



> _Dedicated to my first friend in this fandom, who I met because of this fic, and who believed in my ability to tell this story (and in me), before I believed in myself. This story exists because of you._
> 
> ###  Extras For this Fic 
> 
>       
>  [ ✦ Starry AU World building & Update Schedule](https://starry-citadel-au.neocities.org/)  
> [ Follow along fic Playlist on Spotify ](https://open.spotify.com/user/qgd6gt9y4l98ubsslngy6a3ue/playlist/1w3op6U70gxiS1SKF2SZxX?si=-0bbrCNMSNGU3jYX9diZHA)  
> [ Afterlife fanart on the Starry AU Mastadon ](https://fandom.ink/@left_handed_rick)  
> [ YouTube playlist of theories and ideas referenced in this fic](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrWLuvbMN7cC_HGCWzz4-JTsBawgdlwxc)  
> 
>   
> 

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Remember, look up at the stars, not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see and wonder about what makes the universe exist." - Stephen Hawking_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Recommended Listening: [ Look on down From the Bridge, by Mazzy Star ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwVXkM_YxMg) (You know, that song that played in R&M when they changed realities the first time, and buried their own bodies)
> 
> TWs for this Chapter: Suicide Ideation, Suicide Attempt, Romanticizations of Self Harm, Unhealthy Grand-parenting

Morty stood in the only place of solitude he had ever been able to find within the dysfunctional residence of the Smith household, which was to say, he found himself outside of it.

He chewed the emotions on his lips before inserting a fist between his teeth. The pressure of flesh pressing against teeth held back the tears and stifled screams that wouldn't end if he allowed them to escape. He closed his eyes, and gnawed on muscle and tendons until he tasted iron.

It was a beautiful night. The endless expanse of the universe rose above him in an incandescent river of stars, but all the young teen could focus on was the gravitational undercurrent which pulled him back towards the earth.

Morty continued to shoegaze as he watched the rubber of his sneakers scrape across the plastic roofing, and edge towards the precipice of his superficial life.  

He wasn’t here to look up at the stars and be reminded of an insignificance he already fundamentally understood. He was here to look down at the reality in which he existed, and contemplate his inconsequential, meaningless existence within it.

While nothing mattered as a general concept, Morty had only recently woke to the soul crushing revelation that there wasn’t anything of particular substance to be found about _his_  existence at all.

He was a blank slate.  

His desire to disappear burdened nothing and no one. He pressed the toe of his shoe, watching it fold over the edge while he scrubbed shaky fingers through the strands of his chestnut hair.

The dull throb of teeth marks on his hand burned with the motion. For months, he had been romanticizing the bargain of just a little more pain for the ability to disconnect from his body entirely.

Morty indulged the fantasy of being able to feel every single nerve ending on his body simultaneously blowing open until his empty existence was consumed into oblivion, then absolute nothing.

Adrenaline stirred the contents of his stomach and his pulse screamed from the veins they were trapped within.

He leaned his body a little bit further into the pull of the universe and nervously swallowed.

“You know, that jump’s not gonna kill you.”

Morty’s actions froze. He recognized the voice, but fell into a long silence refusing to acknowledge its owner. He felt the warm breeze of the summer night brush against his skin, and he gripped the bend of his arm feeling his body begin to shake.

Rick wasn't supposed to be here tonight.

Morty wondered exactly how long his grandfather had felt entitled to watch his grandson contemplate suicide before making his presence known. Something about this thought in particular both infuriated and deeply saddened the boy. The closest person in his life could indifferently watch such a scene. A lump caught in Morty’s throat as the teen felt a mixture of hurt, shame and embarrassment rise to his cheeks. Fresh tears pricked at the corners of his eyes. He bit down hard at his tounge and held his silence.   

Rick clambered over to where Morty stood peering off the edge and sat next to him. Even while sitting next to the standing teen, the crown of the scientist’s head reached Morty’s navel. His long legs dangled over the sides of the roof and he allowed them to jovially kick back and forth. He sipped his flask and took in the view of the night sky. Morty refused to look in his direction.

His grandfather broke the silence with a low whistle and hummed in satisfaction.

“Picked a beautiful night to try’n slip into the void, Morty.”

Morty was never sure if his grandfather was being sincere or patronizing. Earnestly in good spirits from hard liquor, or putting on some show. He released his tongue and chocked on the emotion that chased his words, “Fuck _off,_ Rick!”

Were it any other moment between them, Morty would have been surprised at his own curtness. However, all things considered, telling his grandfather to _fuck off_ had been not only an accurate description of what he actually did, but was also exceedingly polite when compared to the alternative statements Morty had swallowed.

Without skipping a beat the older man smirked as if he were accepting some sort of a challenge. Everything was always some stupid game to him.

“All I’m saying - If you wanted to go  _'off yourself,'_ you should have come to me for help - You know, let ol’ grandpa lend you a supportive hand - Because I can give you the kind of psychological breakthrough people pay top-dollar for.”

Rick’s next words were low and even. “Here, Lemme show you.”

Before Morty could answer, he felt the weight of his grandfather’s hand shove his body into the pull of gravity.

In the brief moment of suspension before his mind caught up to the feeling of plunging towards the impact of hard concrete, Morty was flying. He looked up, and took in the stars.

There was an entire universe hidden behind his grandfather's eyes as he revealed an uncharacteristically tender smile. As Morty felt his body return to earth, Rick watched as his grandson’s biological mechanisms of self-preservation kicked in, reigniting his will to live.

Morty believed It wasn’t until that moment, that they truly met one another.   

At that moment, Morty realized a substantive quantifiable truth about his existence that he had previously been unable to acknowledge.

 

He was in love with the person who had just pushed him over the edge.   

 

Stargazing dictated that he fell in love at first sight.   

Shoegazing reminded him that Rick was right.

 

The fall wouldn’t kill him.

 

He heard his bones crack long before he felt them. The pain of feeling every cell in his body strike like a match against the hard pavement incessantly reminded Morty that he was all too alive.  

Physical suffering gave him permission to _finally_ let out the endless stream of screams and tears until he blacked out from the pain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Playing a bit with Sun Tzu's philosophy, AKA Joss Whedon's modern [ Firefly ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcEdfViFL3A) interpretation, “Live with a man 40 years. Share his house, his meals. Speak on every subject. Then tie him up, and hold him over the volcano's edge. And on that day, you will finally meet the man.”
> 
> Rick is a character with a very hard exterior. At his darkest and most nihilistic, he puts off a [ Nietzschean "übermensch" ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxiKqA-u8y4) vibe, rewarding the mindset of, "What doesn't kill you, only makes you stronger". His response to suffering of those he cares about is not to offer comfort, but to do what he thinks will help make them become stronger.


	2. Star-Crossed Lovers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“It’s the gravity that shapes the large scale structure of the universe, even though it is the weakest of four categories of forces.” – Stephen Hawking_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Get Ready for some Angst. (But seriously, warm beverages and blankets)
> 
> TWs for this Chapter: Depression, Dubcon, sexual assault related PTSD, Heavy Handed Realism courtesy of Rick, Messy Emotions shitting all over the place courtesy of Morty

Morty reminisced the memory of the first time he had attempted taking his own life at 14, and had instead, fallen in love with his grandfather.

_If only falling in love from the top of a roof had killed me._

The thing about letting self-preservation mechanisms reignite a will to live, is that, while illuminating, it's nothing more than a temporary adrenaline fix, not all that different from using addictive drugs to escape.

If Morty had truly wanted to live in that moment, Rick’s lesson would have been a brilliant one. Aside from the unintended consequence of solidifying the apathy he held towards his own life, his only real takeaway from the experience had been a refined taste for experiencing pain.

Adventures with Rick were a good distraction.

Now at the cusp of 18, Morty remained equally disillusioned. Equally in love, pumping oxytocin for the cocktail of self-destructive bad habits sitting in front of him. 

The perspective he held was unhealthy and reeked of toxic co-dependence, but he really didn’t give a flying fuck. He had picked up a few of Ricks vices, including his trash mouth, and tendency to fuck around. And a few of his own. Smoking, and trying to get his grandfather to fuck around with him.

Morty had waited until he was of a _non-taboo age_ to approach the now _slightly less taboo_ topic with any seriousness. Rick had some sort of fixation on Morty not knowing what the fuck he wanted because we wasn’t a _consenting adult_ \- as if that same logic stopped him from throwing Morty balls deep onto an alien planet to be his errand boy.

It was hard to find the seemingly shifting moral lines in the sand the scientist drew. 

Rick always cut off Morty's attempts to talk about it,  _“If you wanna have this conversation when you're old enough to have it, we’ll talk then.”_  Which was a nice, deflective way to insinuate that Rick didn’t see Morty as mature enough to have the conversation at all.

When Morty pressed further, which he had done on more than one occasion, Rick politely shut the conversation down,  _“Lock it up, Morty! Shut your fucking trap, because we are not having this conversation!”_

And that was the end of it.

The most frustrating part of it all, Morty considered, was that their mutual feelings felt like the most obvious secret in the universe. They acted like a couple. Glances that lasted too long. Touches that lingered. The too close to be considered appropriate kind of closeness that constantly existed in the spaces between them. There were sudden tender smiles Rick occasionally threw his way in admiration, that Morty knew were for him and no one else.

Then there were capricious statements meant to tear Morty’s self-esteem down just as quickly. Eventually, Morty understood it was a distancing mechanism that Rick strategically employed whenever he felt they were getting _too_ close for comfort. While Morty understood the intended effect, trying to understand the motivation behind it left him in abject confusion.

He didn’t understand, If they both had wanted this so much, why couldn’t they just let it happen.

 

“Hey Morty, c-could you grab me the size 4 laser calibrator?”

 

Rick’s voice pulled Morty from his meandering thoughts. They often sat together in comfortable silences while working in the garage. The radio hummed as the only noise between them. He glanced up at the clock realizing how late it had already become.

He walked to the toolbox mounted on the wall. The nostalgia of a summer night gave him courage. He returned to the workbench with the calibrator having decided to _carpe the fucking diem_. Rick grabbed for it, and Morty teasingly pulled it away, before setting it in his grandfather's hand and returning to his stool.  

Both of them were in an unusually good mood tonight. Rick was moderately sober, and Morty was moderately high.

It should have been their last summer together, but Morty hadn’t made any plans for college in the fall. He told his parents he was waiting to hear back from a few, but the truth was that he hadn’t even bothered to apply. He honestly hadn’t thought he would make it through another summer.

He chewed his lip as he searched for the exact loaded words to use. Morty wanted to elicit a strong reaction from his grandfather because his retaliation was critical. It was going to ruin the good atmosphere of the day, but Morty knew Rick. The only way this conversation would ever happen, would be if Rick felt it was happening on his terms.

“Hey, Rick.”

Morty internally prepared himself for a game of sticks and stones. 

“Do you think you could have ever loved me?”

Morty hadn’t intended the question to emerge sounding so vulnerable. But it had. Morty had voiced a deep-seated fear held secretly close to his heart suggesting Rick never truly loved him to begin with.

Morty leaned forward watching his grandfather’s movements still.

Rick’s eyes were beginning to lose their sharpness, and he refused to admit the need for glasses. He was working on some specially designed “Retina Augmentation Device” and the name itself threatened both of them from ever calling it what it actually was: fancy contacts. So that Rick could continue to enjoy the sense of sight.

His entire frame sighed.

“I’m impressed with the creative angle, Morty, but you’re seriously gonna bring this up again?”  His response was more tired than usual.

“So let’s cut the shit. You know what I mean, Rick.”

“Since you’re helping me out today - and asked _so nicely_ , I’ll take the bait and humor you. But that kind of question is wa~y too loaded to be coming out of your mouth, Morty." Rick scoffed, "You shouldn’t be this fuckin jaded at 18.”

Rick pushed away from his desk and swiveled his chair to face Morty. He placed a hand on Morty’s cheek and patted it with an earnest smile and a light chuckle. Morty had gotten much better and discerning Rick’s expressions. He was being sincere.

“Kid, if you had shown up in my life when I was in my mid 20s, I would have thought the stars had fucking aligned. We would have skirted the draft like young punks in love, then eloped from the planet to spend the next half-century of our honeymoon traversing galaxies. We’d have grown old together and hurled ourselves into a collapsing star when we were ready - all while holding hands like some fucked up Douglas Adams' retelling of _Thelma and Louise_.”

Rick leaned back in his chair and gave Morty a once over before continuing.

“Is that what you want to hear?”

“That was a roundabout way to say no...”

The laugher in Ricks voice fell as a slight irritation grew. He still spoke in a friendly manner with the young adult.  

“I _love_ you Morty. Present tense. So you can fuck right off with that planetary mindset. Just because _my_ idea of love isn't the same as _yours_ doesn’t mean it’s not as meaningful.”

“I never sai -” Morty began before Rick cut him off.

“You did...Don’t high road me, Morty - because I’m being the objective realist about the kind of love we can healthily share.”

“And you,” The old man raised his eyebrows towards the young adult while accusingly pointing the calibrator towards him, “are being a stunted 18 year old who thinks he’s figured out all the answers to life when he's just thinking with his dick.”

Morty pouted as Rick leaned back in his chair deep in thought. He had been running mental scenarios of conversation patterns, and struggling to find the right words, but so far he had made no attempt to shut the conversation down. Morty’s heart beat in hopefulness. Rick was finally opening the conversation. They were finally going to talk about this as adults.

“What _you_ want Morty, is a life together with someone. I know you want me to be that someone for you…but you’re half a century too late.” Morty felt the prickle of an impending rejection and held his breath. “It doesn’t matter to you yet Morty, but I’m old, and dying a lot faster than you, and trust me, that _will_ matter. Even with cybernetic augmentations I’d maybe make it to - and I’m being generous here considering my vices - a ballpark of 120.”

There was so much Morty wanted to say, but he remained silent for fear of interrupting the rare moment of Rick openly sharing what was on his mind.

As if it were some inside joke that only the universe could fully comprehend, [Lynn Anderson](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-eclUz-RYI), began to play from the radio speakers in the background.

 

  _I beg your pardon I never promised you a rose garden -  
_ _Along with the sunshine, There's gotta be a little rain sometime..._

 

Earlier in the summer, the duo had decided the radio station Rick favored had a raging hardon for this song. It religiously played at least once a day over the radiowaves.

One afternoon when recognizing it play, Morty took a moment to pay attention to the lyrics. He laughed, then made a caustic joke towards Rick, " _Honey_ , _This song - it's perfect for the two of us. It's our song!"_

The next time it sounded on the radio, as if to rise to the challenge and subvert any negative meaning Morty had internally applied to it, Rick turned the volume knob as far as it would rotate. With far too much enthusiasm and talent, he danced and lip-synced the words verbatim to Morty’s embarrassment. He later revealed it had been one of his favorite songs when he was Morty's age. B _efore punk happened, there was that whole honky-tonk shit people got into._

After that, it stuck, and they had fallen into a ridiculous summer routine of mock singing and dancing with each other in the garage every time it played.

It was moments like those Morty loved most with Rick, because in those innocuous spaces everything else faded. Age didn’t matter. labels held no meaning.

Nothing else existed but them.

“I know how old you are, Rick.” Morty was careful with his response, “I’ve spent the last five years by your side.”  

“And I’m gonna remind you that those were adventures, Morty.” Rick refuted, “The thing about adventures is - they’re just that: High stakes! Conflict! Resolution! All in a neat little digestible bow...Far from real life, Morty.”

Rick reached for his flask, deciding he was far too sober for this conversation to proceed. He took a long pull before offering it to Morty. Morty took a drink and passed it back.    

“I'm humoring you Morty, Aside from the hypothetical 'adventure' where we pack our bags and escape into the night leaving everything we’ve ever known behind us, the kind of relationship you think you want takes hard, repetitive work, kid.”

Morty felt the burn of the alcohol settle into his stomach. He swallowed the taste in his mouth.

“I’m not saying a healthier relationship isn't worth working for, but both people need to be active participants - I’m pretty set in my ways, and since you barely make an effort show up for your own life - I~I don’t think it’s really gonna be your slice of pie when the afterglow fades and we’re left stranded in a failing relationship that neither of us are willing to show up and put the work into.”

Before Morty could respond Rick interjected, “- A-And I can promise you. That’s the _best_ case scenario for us, Morty.”

Morty had pushed Rick's buttons fully knowing the scientist was going to push some of his back, but Rick had stepped on Morty’s insecurities with surgical precision, and was just warming up. 

Rick frowned acknowledging the change in Morty’s expression. Since they were having this conversation, there was no point in being ineffective about it, even if emotions got stirred. He continued to make his point.

“Because the worst case scenario, Morty, is that we put in the work - stay in love.”

Morty looked up at Rick, confused. 

“I’d feel guilty that you got so little time with me. I’d try’n stick around as long as I could - until I couldn’t wipe my ass or remember my own name, and you’d spend the last active years of your life being my live-in.”

Rick scrubbed his hands through his hair and rubbed his temples before taking another shot from his flask. Morty felt his lip begin to quiver.

“Have you ever taken care of someone who's dying, Morty? Do you think that’s what I _want_ for you? To let you be that person for me - cleaning up my piss and shit for a decade on top of the time I already cheated you on because I’m 56 years your senior?”

Morty bit his tongue. He felt like he were being scolded. Rick had never shared his fears of growing old, but as he outlined them one by one in the context of a hypothetical relationship, Morty began to understand how deeply Rick actually had considered this. How afraid he was of it. Ricks voice continued to rise. 

“I-I’d fuckin hate myself If I fucked you up _so bad_ that you’d be the kind of person who would willingly give that to me out of some sense of obligation, or duty, or _love_.” Rick spat out the term, “After everything I’ve taught you, I’m not going to be complicit in causing that kind of a life for you - and Honestly, I’d rather put a bullet through my fucking head.”

Morty didn’t know how to respond. His eyes were burning.  

“Are we getting warmer to the answer you were looking for, or is your little wet-dream of intergenerational incestuous sex still fucking with your ability to use your head.”

Morty was caught off guard at Rick's final cheap shot, and felt the tears start to spill from his eyes. He quickly wiped them away before they could fall.

“Yeah, you fucking made your point. Satisfied?”

The sudden change in atmosphere caused Rick’s anger to deflate. He approached Morty with a softer voice, and took the late teen's hands in his own, cradling them to his chest. His thumb circled Morty’s knuckles as Rick's expression revealed a mixture of, exhaustion and uncertainty.  

“Morty, for once in my life - I don’t know. I’ve given you the stars, I’ve given you my knowledge. I've given so much of myself to you. From every life skill you'll ever use, to your bad habits and pretentious fucking taste in music - I'll be in all of those things with you as long as you live...”

Morty didn’t want to dwell on the understanding that Rick listed those things with the implication that he would one day leave Morty behind.

“If that isn’t love Morty, tell me what is, because I would literally move the earth and stars for you. Tell me, what the fuck else is there?”  

Morty didn’t know why it wasn’t enough for him.

“I want...the life we never gave ourselves the chance to live.”

And there it was. Morty hadn’t fully understood what he truly wanted until he had listened to his own voice reveal it under pressure. At realizing the sincerity of what he had just asked for, and understanding that it was something even Rick himself, could never give, Morty cried. Rick pulled Morty into a hug, and brushed the tears from his eyes, leaning in further to kiss away the tears that remained.

“I love you, Morty.”

Rick rarely said those words to him, let alone in such a sincere, heartfelt tone. He preferred to let his actions speak in their place. Morty felt his heart ache in so many complex ways, He wanted Rick to hold him like this until they existed in a moment where nothing else mattered.   

“I want you, Rick.”

Rick ran his fingers through Morty’s hair and whispered sweet nothings into his brow pulling him closer.

“I love you, Morty.”

“I want you so fucking much it hurts.”

Rick's hands wrapped around Morty's waist, moving him from the stool to the work desk. The older man held the younger's face in his hands and they shared eye contact for a long moment before Rick let out a heavy sigh.

“Fuck. Okay.”

He pulled Morty into a deep kiss. They explored each others mouths as their hands traveled along bodies. Rick rolled his hips into Morty’s parted legs as the brunette gasped, fisting Ricks lab coat.

He gestured to remove the older man’s clothing, Rick tensed. He was uncharacteristically nervous and vulnerable as he allowed Morty to push off his lab coat and pull his shirt over his head. Rick kissed at Morty’s neck.

“I love you, Morty.”

Morty’s chest tightened at the exhilaration that this was finally happening. He wanted this more than he wanted the air in his lungs. Rick pushed up Morty’s shirt and the boy felt liberated with the brush of those shaky hands across his stomach that burned lines of pleasure deep into his core.

Rick’s head dipped down. He pushed Morty on his back to trail kisses along his navel, before unbuttoning his pants and tugging them them off. He took a deep breath and paused before stripping the under layer of Morty’s clothes. Morty thrust his hips forward and removed his own shirt calling out his grandfather's name. Rick responded with a low growl, pinning the boy onto the workbench and taking in another hungry kiss. A low moan escaped from his voice.  

“God fucking damnit, I love you Morty. Never forget that I - Never question how much I fucking love you.”

Morty reached down to unbutton his partner’s pants freeing his growing erection. He pressed their bodies together wanting to feel as much skin as possible. He pulled Rick into a deep, open mouthed kiss as Rick continued whispering his earnest mantra between heavy pants.

“I love you, Morty”

Rick reached between them to stroke Morty’s erection, which was slick with precum. He hesitantly thumbed the underside of Morty’s thigh as the brunette lifted his ankle around the older man’s waist. Morty closed his eyes and tossed his head back as he drank in the sensation of Rick jerking them off.  

“I love you, Morty...I - Fuck!”

Morty picked up on the slight change in Rick's voice, but he was immediately pulled from his spell of lust at hearing the crack. He glanced between them, to find Rick desperately stroking their erections together. Rick was stroking his flaccid dick against morty’s erection.

“Fuck.”

By the time Morty had processed the scene before him, tears were falling from his grandfather’s eyes. The sight sent morty into reactive panic. He wasn’t sure what had just happened, but he had experienced enough sex to understand something was very wrong. They needed to stop.  

“Rick, stop! Stop.” Morty forcefully shushed, “It’s okay.” He pulled Rick’s hands away and wrapped them around his shoulders. Rick was sweating profusely. Morty quickly pulled the lower halves of their bodies apart and grabbed his grandfather’s discarded shirt to cover himself.  

“It’s okay.”

“- love you...Morty”

Rick gently cradled Morty in his arms and apologized in broken chants of I love you’s. Morty held his grandfather as he fell apart and sobbed at the realization that he couldn’t get it up for the person he loved. Rick’s body shook and hyperventilated in-between strangled sobs, and Morty panicked because he didn’t know what to do.

He held onto the person in his arms as if both of their lives depended on it.

Morty had panic attacks before, But he had never seen anything like this from Rick. He’d never seen the man cry, let alone become a convulsing, heaving mess in his arms. Rick had attempted to give Morty what he had asked for to the point of triggering a deep trauma of which Rick had never spoken. 

Morty told himself this was all his fault. He pushed it too far, and now, Rick was falling apart in his arms in a way that terrified Morty to his core, and he didn't know how to be there for him.

“Rick, I’m sorry.”

He began to cry with him.

“I’m sorry! I don’t care about that anymore! I love you, Rick! I’ll fucking love you forever, do you understand? It's okay! _It's okay_.”

They held each other together like that on the workbench, and sobbed into the early hours of the morning. Nothing else existed in that moment with them. When they left the space, it was in silence. They dressed, and put themselves back together to only retreat into their separate rooms. 

As Morty stared at his ceiling, a deep understanding stirred within the memory he held of that night. It was defining.

Although Rick would remain deeply platonically in love with Morty, That night would be the first and final moment their relationship would ever have.  

He sang _their song,_  alone, and cried anew in the privacy of his room.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is a link to the [ Lynn Anderson song ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-eclUz-RYI) mentioned in this chapter.  
> Here is a link to the [ ending scene of Thelma & Lousie. ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4z88U915uq8) Damn! Those gay feels!  
> 


	3. Time's Arrow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW's for this Chapter: Self Harm (Cutting), Suicide in the Literal and Theoretical sense.

“Wait, You’re saying it was never about our brainwaves cancelling each other out?”

Rick and Morty had been doing some repair and maintenance on the portal gun, when Rick lamented to himself that the fundamental laws of physics could be a real bitch sometimes. The doors to interdimensional travel _just had to be_ safest in pairs.

“Morty, did you actually believe me when I said that shit about you being as dumb as I was smart? No, my existence needs another existing constant to leverage entanglement. - I-If I’m Schrodinger's cat, Morty, you’re the flea riding my ass in a mutually symbiotic relationship. I’ve been entangling our sub-atomic particles, then using the mixture of that data to collapse our combined wave function into another dimension. - Y-You ever wondered where those [ Morty-Rick's](https://www.reddit.com/r/rickandmorty/comments/632zfj/you_either_die_a_morty_or_live_long_enough_to_see/) come from? Heheh, it’s like a .000001% chance, but when it happens, that's a cake that can't be unbaked.”

“What else was I supposed to believe? I was like, 14, and you knew everything!”  

Morty hadn’t fully grasped the concepts of quantum physics like Rick had, but he understood the basics: Ricks and Mortys were the axiom along the central finite curve; the constant that could act as both interdimensional transmitter and receiver for the portal gun. Traveling as a pair introduced an algorithmic failsafe into the equation - making the portal gun much safer to use simply because it provided two sets of information that existed independently from each other.  

Morty felt a glow settle in his chest and he smiled to himself, understanding that Rick had chosen him to be the constant.  

“Yeesh, Morty - Learn to give yourself some credit. If you remember, I _also_ told you school wasn’t a place for smart people. You’re 18 and you understand almost everything I’ve taught you. I didn’t figure out half this shit out 'til I was at least 30; T-the apple fell straight fucking down.”  

Morty's smile deepened. Rick rarely gave him praise. Even though it was wrapped up in a correction with the implication of Morty's naivety, he happily accepted it. 

"Wait, Rick, you Just said you break us down into sub-atomic particles and send the blueprints to another dimension. If the portal gun uses entanglement, then isn't it like...a suicide to walk through a portal?"

"Don't jizz your pants at the thought, Morty, It's 100% you that walks out of the portal ... no cloning principle. Although, Schrodinger's cat jokes aside, when the ' _we'_ of our dimension we exist outside of our dimension, technically speaking, we can't also simultaneously exist in our home dimension."

"So in our own timeline we just - stop existing every now and then?"

Morty leaned onto Rick's workdesk, nesting his chin in folded arms.

"That sounds like an accurate description of my life."     

 

*******

 

A few weeks had passed from the night in the garage. Neither dared to bring it up to the other, and as the days awkwardly passed between them Morty racked his brain trying to think of a solution, knowing there wouldn't be one.  

He tried to force himself to accept what he _could_ have. The “ _objective realist”_ form of love which Rick had offered him.

 

Fuck, did he try.

 

Then, he tried to get black-out drunk on Rick’s stash in the garage. In an inebriated rage, he broke the bottle against the edge of the workdesk, then dragged a jagged shard of glass across his forearm, remembering why he avoided alcohol.

Once he was impaired, there was a certain ease in which he fantasized about killing himself. That alcohol-induced loss of control scared the shit out of Morty because If he were going to take his own life, he wanted to be in absolute control of the decision.      

Since the night he fell from the roof, Morty acknowledged that he never quite stopped feeling that ever-present pull of gravity, which even after breaking so many of his fragile bones, still caused his joints to ache with nostalgic fondness of a return.  

Shortly after that incident, the teen, confused and afraid, confided in Rick his desire to self harm. That was the night his grandfather introduced Morty to recreational drugs, and they blazed space weed in some shitty motel into the early morning hours; waking up to find themselves tangled in each other’s embrace. 

Weed was the drug Morty turned to when he wanted to get well.

Alcohol was the drug he sought out when he wanted to be consumed.      

Morty shouted at himself and angrily tossed the bloodied shard of glass across the room, having changed his mind on following through with anything on the same workdesk where everything had fucking gone to shit. 

It would be too symbolic, and Morty didn't want Rick to blame himself for what had already been a long time coming. Instead, he passed out with his face buried in the fabric of Rick's lab coat, which was now a mess of vomit, blood, and tears.

Morty woke up in his bed the next morning, without even the slightest headache - all cleaned up and lovingly put back together. The only evidence to show the previous night had really occurred, was the newly installed biometric lock on Rick’s cabinet.

They proceeded to not talk to each other.

Which resulted in Rick pulling a classic: He belligerently stumbled into Morty’s room late at night, having consumed excessive amounts of the great social lubricator in an attempt to have another deeply important, half-remembered conversation with his grandson.

Morty imagined Rick turned to alcohol both to grant himself permission to feel and simultaneously protect himself from feeling those very emotions. Hard liquor was more effective than a memory wipe; only one them would wake to remember the bleeding heart conversations the following morning.  

That night, in an unending stream of non-linear, half-conscious, sweet nothings, Rick dug himself under the covers of Morty's twin bed and wrapped the brunette in his arms to beg for a promise. 

Ricks drunken words were often his sober thoughts.

_"Just, don’t do this alone - promise me that you won't do it alone Mo-OUGHR-ty, don't leave without me. L-let grandpa join you. Please, let grandpa be there with you."_

Following the fallout, in their shared silence, the two had mutually understood that if nothing changed, they were condemning themselves to follow time’s arrow to an inevitable logical conclusion.

Rick had shown up that night to take Morty’s hand and walk the the final stretch of that conclusion with him.

Morty's nerves swam in his stomach, because 'please' was not a word in Rick's vocabulary. Rick doesn't ask. But he was asking for this.

Selfishly not wanting such a thing for Rick, and remembering that this was a conversation that would just as soon be forgotten by the both of them, Morty gently refused such a promise, reminding Rick that this wasn’t a _Thelma and Louise_ adventure.

Rick slurred through his delusions and told Morty in broken phrases that he was proud of him. That his greatest gift in life was getting to watch Morty become his own person. He was certain Morty would be so much better than him. Fuck, he already was better. Even though he had dealt with so much, he was still a good kid with a heart of gold and just knowing that made Rick truly happy. He did at least one thing right. Rick just wanted Morty to know that. He would always be so fucking proud of him.

Morty felt hot tears run from his cheeks and soak into the pillow as he took in Ricks words. He clung to the man in his arms, because hearing Rick say _I’m proud of you_ in such a way, felt too much like he were saying goodbye.

Morty had been deeply fearful in the last few weeks that Rick would pack his ship and run away. The drunken words whispered with sense of urgency and finality felt like a bittersweet confirmation of his fears.

The last thing Rick wanted to teach Morty. The last thing he wanted Morty to know were the words Morty had always wanted, and Rick had always withheld.

 _"I'm proud of you Morty._ _"_   

It was a long while before their hushed whispers died and silence returned to the room. Morty watched the stars through his bedroom window, anxiously waiting to hear the sounds of Rick's breath rise and fall with the pattern of sleep. He wanted to fall asleep and wake up tangled in Rick's arms and in a moment that existed for no one else but them.

Rick rose from the bed and slowly pulled himself away. Morty's gaze chased after him, silently pleading for him to return. The silhouette of Rick's lithe frame towered over Morty at his bedside. They held eye contact in the darkness for what felt like an eternity before rick turned to leave. As he did, his voice cut through the darkness with a low and piercing clarity. 

 

_"Give up on this timeline, Morty. Give yourself a fresh start, and give us both the life we never had the chance to live."_

 

***

 

Morty remembered an afternoon discussing time travel with his grandfather.

It was the official "Back to the Future" day in October. They had just finished a couch marathon of the entire franchise, and were animatedly discussing the movie's realistic and unrealistic utilization of time travel theories.

Morty loved the cheeseball 80's films for the same reason he loved _ball fondlers_ - they were fucking ridiculous. Morty and Rick both had a habit of adding unsolicited running commentary to anything they watched together (Television or Lifeforms). So naturally, the entire night consisted of the pair cracking jokes about each other through making fun of the on-screen characters who seemed like a bad parody of themselves.

Doc reminded Morty of his own grandfather, and although Rick detested the comparison as much as _wholesome family films_ , he had reluctantly joined Morty on the couch, and took up calling him "Marty" for the remainder of the night just to fuck with him. 

Rick, having felt emasculated by Morty's open admiration of the older man who, Morty all too quickly pointed out, seemed like a much healthier, less nihilistic version of his own grandfather, needed to one-up the fictional character.

Rick smugly and not-so-subtly revealed he had figured that time-travel shit out years ago.  _Spoiler: you didn't power it with fucking plutonium, "Marty"._

That was how Morty learned that the portal gun was actually in part, a time travel device, but it was really only practical for laterally moving between dimensional timelines.

“-Which is technically lateral-interdimensional time travel, Morty, but I’m gonna save the semantics and marketing bullshit for another lesson. - It’s just trademar- more practical to call them dimensions. Look...You don't hear me saying, " _Oh My! I need to charge my 'Quantum Tunneling Device!_ ' - that's got no marketing flair!”

Rick explained, In addition to creating a portal which would allow it's user to quantum tunnel between branches of the central finite curve,The Portal Gun™ calibrated each tunnel to connect at parallel points of linear time (each timeline, being measured in relation to the central finite curve).

Morty remembered an adventure where Rick’s portal gun had spat out an angry red color. Rick had only caught the hem of his shirt seconds before Morty walked into it. Rick nodded at the remembrance, telling him it wasn't calibrated correctly.

"Y~Yeeeaaah, I-I was super fucked up that night and typed the coordinates of the dimension we were standing in, and then some. We would have time travelled our own timeline to fuck knows where. - Heh, why else do you think I made it red? Even when you’re fuckin shitfaced you can figure out that a giant red portal means stop and green means go.”

So linear time travel within one's own timeline was completely in the realm of possibility for Rick, but the Scientist had abandoned further exploration of it simply because there was no feasible way to use the technology to immediately benefit _himself_. Morty pressed his grandfather for more information.

"It's either gotta be some sort of built-in failsafe or the ultimate poetic justice of the universe, Morty, You can go back in time and change anything you ever fucking wanted. But it will never change _your_  reality. - My hot take? Why bother? If there's nothing in it for you, then there's no reason to fuck with the quantum arrow of time."

Morty asked Rick to humor him, nonetheless, "Okay, but what if we ever wanted to pull off some kind of a _Doc and Marty_  adventure?" 

“Hypothetically speaking, Morty, _Marty_  hadn't thought that shit through and started fucking around with his own existence - and if you look closely, his own mom."

"Is that an Oedipus kink I sense?"

"Is that projection, ' _Marty'_  - Anyways, that's a recipe for way more than a fuckin' paradox, but since we're using pop culture as our playbook, _[Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFy17auuK08) _ is how you should be looking at it. Same pitfalls, but at least those two knew how to have a good time fucking around with them."

Rick threw some popcorn in his mouth as he continued, "The safest way to time travel your own dimension is with a one time, one way ticket. You'd cease to exist from the point you abandoned, and emerge having split your born-again-virgin-ass into an entirely new timeline and reality to exist in. Bonus points if you can learn from Marty McMotherfucker, and pick a point in time where you don't simultaneously exist within a generation, cause it gets a lot fuckin' weirder than an 80's kids show."

"You're talking about the grandfather paradox, right?" 

"Yeah but with a dash of Groundhog Day. In theory, instead of splitting into your own timeline you could end up with two superimposed timelines simultaneously running on some fucked up mobius strip of a timeline in a never-ending loop. - That's why I've never bothered with it. There's nothing in my past or outside of it that I wanna change so strongly, that the jump would be worth it." 

"What if you wanted to change something for someone else though, and not yourself?"

Rick pursed his lips in thought for a long moment, before throwing a piece of popcorn at the teen.

"That's where the poetic justice comes in, Morty. Hypothetically It would be the most justifiable motivation, and carry the least risk, but again, you wouldn't be changing anything for that person in _your_ reality, just the person in the reality you created." 

 

_***_

Aside from the garage, Morty stood in the only other place of solitude he had ever been able to find within the dysfunctional residence of the Smith household, which was to say, he found himself outside of it.

There was only one person who had truly ever given substance to Morty’s existence - and he was right.

This reality would kill him. 

But If Rick had taught Morty any valuable overarching life lessons, It was that if he didn't like something, to take it into his own hands and fucking change it. Then, because he was a man of action himself, the scientist literally granted Morty the power to do so.

In every single one of Rick's acts to impart knowledge, he had also given Morty a blessing to wield it as his own person, and as Morty sat on the rooftop in awe at the endless expanse of the milky way that rose above him, he was reminded of the man he so loved, and for that, the stars would always be beautiful. It had never been so obvious as it was in this moment, that Rick had always been proud of Morty. 

That from the moment of their first adventure, Rick had been preparing the young adult to continue living in a world without him, because that was the only thing in the universe the Scientist could not teach him how to do. Morty understood with a deep aching in his chest that Rick had known all along that this timeline was fucked for the pair of star-crossed lovers.   

_"Kid, if you had shown up in my life when I was in my mid 20's, I would have thought the stars had fucking aligned!"_

The memory rang with more clarity and understanding than it ever had for Morty. Rick loved Morty, and wished things could have been different too. 

The young adult rose, sensing it was time. Fuck being star-crossed when you had the power to move the earth and stars for the person you loved. This was something only Morty could do, a power he wielded independently from the Scientist who had taught him everything.

It was his decision alone, and Morty decided that figuratively, he had died in this timeline long ago. He would literally die if he remained.

He pulled out Rick's portal gun and dialed the coordinates to his own dimension: 55 years in the past - 1971, as Rick had drunkenly suggested that night. Rick would be 24. Morty would be on the cusp of 19.  

The portal bloomed a deep red. He had no idea what he was going to find in his next life. An entire future expanded before him, hidden on the other side of the veil. All he needed to do was jump. The feelings of that night from all those years ago re-surfaced, as Morty felt his biological mechanisms of self-preservation stir. They were a bit different this time. 

 

Morty knew death, and was no longer afraid of it. The mechanisms stirred with fear of the unknown.

 

He was afraid to live. 

 

With his confrontations of death, Morty had long understood that to be able to take your life in a sudden act of suicide, the mental desire to follow through needed to be stronger than the singularly focused self-preservation mechanisms of the body. Making the jump through the portal was similar. He zipped up his coat, picked up his bags, and closed his eyes. There could be no hesitation.  

He chewed the emotions on his lips, wondering if he should tell him goodbye. Then, with a wave of unexpected emotion that surged at the realization, he understood.

 

There was nothing to say, nor explain. Rick had left his portal gun on the desk for Morty to find.  

 

Rick knew. He understood everything there ever was to be said about it.

 

That was all Morty would ever need to know.

 

They really, truly, loved each other. 

 

He dropped the portal gun behind him and jumped. 

 

***

 

 

 

 

 

Rick picked up his portal gun from the rooftop, scanning it's history.

 

Morty no longer existed here.

 

Rick was alone.

 

He had always imagined that he would be the first to go, but the kid had always been better at facing his own death than he. Rick knew that he was ready to face it the night the scientist pushed him from the rooftop. He wasn't really sure what he had been trying to accomplish that night. A lesson or a helping hand.

 

The silence of the night was deafening.   

 

Morty had picked a beautiful night.

  

Rick looked up at stars, and saw his imminent death. Fear and awe rising within him as he confronted an insignificance in which he already fundamentally understood, but woke to the realization that without Morty, the reality in which he existed...was inconsequential.

 

He was reduced to a nothingness in his own mind. 

 

There was nothing to consider, because Rick understood.

 

He admired Morty. He was proud of him.

  

He drained his flask, and wished that Morty would find a life worth doing the work of living.

 

He wished that another version of himself would find that too.

 

He smiled, knowing Morty would be alright.

 

“You're a good kid Morty."

_Be better than me_

 

He imagined meeting Morty in the next life, and pulled the trigger.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The part where Morty remembers rick introducing him to recreational drugs? [ Dazed and Rickfused, by KousKousx ](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4889233/chapters/11211340) is my absoloutle perfect fucking headcannon (minus the sex) for how that night would have gone down. Go read this fic.
> 
> Here’s a quick link that explains my HC for [ how Ricks’ portal gun works ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxQK1WDYI_k&feature=youtu.be) using Quantum Mechanics.
> 
> When talking about linear time travel, Rick refers to the [ Grandfather Paradox ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XayNKY944lY&index=13&list=PL0E2ABD1D84697428), I think this is absolutely hilarious when applied to Rick and Morty. (Little nod to the plot of Back to the Future there, and in the context of this fic, poses some interesting questions.) 
> 
> The Chapter Title: Time’s Arrow refers to the thermodynamic arrow of time, which suggests that in an isolated system, entropy will increase with the progression of time, even though the laws of physics don’t fundamentally require it. Real-world events will always proceed in the direction of decay and chaos. 
> 
> [ The Quantum Arrow of Time Theory ](https://phys.org/news/2017-12-arrow-relative-concept-absolute.html), however is more optimistic. It refers to all potential arrows of time within the multiverse, [ suggesting that the universe continually expands ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uj3_KqkI9Zo)\- rather than shrinks into entropy. 
> 
> It suggests that because the fundamental laws of physics have no preference for a direction in time, entropy-reducing events are possible, but they always erase any evidence of ever having occurred. While also playing with the [ Teletransportation paradox ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAaHHGHuy1c), I interpreted it to mean that Morty understood the act of walking through the portal would essentially be an act of suicide/rebirth. (Hence the title of the fic, afterlife.)
> 
> Please Watch [Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFy17auuK08)


	4. The Scientist

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Sometimes science is more art than science, Morty. A lot of people don't get that."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TWs for this Chapter: Suicide ideation, Attempt. Hopeful Angst? The wonder and curiosity of life, meaning and everything in the universe wrapped up in the ambiguity of cosmic horror.
> 
> PS: I made some art/audio for this chapter. Be sure to click the link in the endnotes after reading.

Much to Rick’s dissatisfaction, Morty believed that the concept of soulmates was a hypothesis worthy of scientific merit. Rick rolled his eyes at the teen as he waxed philosophy, using scientific theories to argue for proof of the greatest romantic concept to exist for humankind.

“No, not in the cosmological sense, scientifically speaking. L-like somehow the sub-atomic particles of your consciousness are entangled with another person’s - and, Y’know, since they are polarized towards each other you feel drawn to that person in a way you’ve _never_ experienced...” Morty trailed his thoughts as he noticed from the corner of his eye that Rick had stopped working, and was now actively listening to him speak.

The older man leaned back in his chair and folded his arms as his lips curved upwards threatening to break into a laugh at any moment. He gave his grandson his full undivided attention, raising an eyebrow to question the boy’s pause.

Morty nervously swallowed as their eyes met, “W-When you finally meet them...it’s like...from the fundamental fibers of your existence...you know...”

Rick’s eyes glistened as he held contact for a moment more before his lips broke into a wide smile and he snorted in dismissal of the idea, “I think you're committing the biggest illusory correlation fallacy of all time, and confusing _actual_ _science_ with an _opposites attract TV trope_ , Morty!”

Morty sighed, rolling his eyes in response to Rick as the scientist returned to his work. Morty thought Rick was taking him seriously, but he just wanted to lead the boy on, and make fun of him all the more for taking his bait.

They were in Rick’s subterranean lab, developing the Traflorkian equivalent of MDMA after Rick realized that it was essentially earth limestone and easy money. Rick preferred dealing off planet.  _Y-You don't shit where you eat, Morty!_   However, the older man was unable to let Morty’s idea go, and shortly after, picked up where he left off in mocking the teen.

“- People aren’t entangled like a pair of hydrogen atoms, Morty. Y-You wanna know what happens when two hydrogen atoms meet like that? Take a look at the fucking nuclear fusion happening in the sun and stars. You’re fuckin -,” He waved his tools at Morty as he laughed harder, unable to contain himself, “You-You’re fuckin’ hopeless-romantic-bullshit boner is conflating the idea of love with the greatest source of concentrated energy in the Universe.”

Morty blushed as Rick made a show of rolling across the surface of his desk in laughter. He wheeled his chair over to Morty and placed a hand on the boys’ shoulder, supporting himself to breathe.  

“Reality check Morty. Biology is a set of self-organizing functions, plain and simple. There's no deeper fucking secret to life than that. Brain activities are equivalent to computers, and consciousness is epiphenomenal illusion.”  

Morty frowned. He hadn't been expecting Rick to agree with his idea, or even acknowledge it as valid, but he didn’t need to be such a dick about it. The teen rose to the challenge of Rick’s game to protect his fledgling scientist pride.

“Yeah, but quantum coherence occurs in biological systems - routinely. Human consciousness _is_ a quantum computation, Rick!...and if it has real-time control, In theory, it _could_ entangle with another consciousness - and that’s like, the entire foundation of eastern spiritualism!”

“You’re fucking gonna add in that Rumi - _fucking_   _Rumi_ had quantum intuition? Holy fuck, Morty, you're killing me over here!”

“Aw, Rick, please just Hear me out on this.” Morty continued to test the idea against the scientist. He just wanted his grandpa to earnestly listen to him for once. He was supposed to be his apprentice, after all.

“It’s like those stories about extrasensory perception: twins or lovers where one gets into a car crash or something, and the other is miles away - But they suddenly feel unexplainable pain and sadness because they just - they just know something is wrong.”    

“Yeah, I’m gonna have to stop you at soulmate twins with a 'sixth sense', Morty - Because this shit has got to be your worst hypothesis yet. All this knowledge, access to my lab, and you wanna use it to search for some sort of fucking soulmate algorithm?”

Morty pouted with a sharp intake of breath. Still chuckling, Rick paused the conversation.  

“Wait. Hold on, Morty,” Rick pulled out his flask, and jokingly shook it in the younger’s face, “I’m not drunk enough for your shit today!”

Morty’s rising blush bloomed into hot anger at his grandfather. His ears burned and his eyes narrowed as he glared at the old man, who dismissed his ideas without so much as giving them a chance. His voice spilled out in angry falsetto cracks that just caused the scientist to tease him further.

“Well I mean - Isn’t that the point of being a fucking scientist? Being more -  more philosophical in your approach to the observable universe surrounding you? To _not_ know everything, and to always try to prove yourself _wrong_ ?”  
  
Morty knew he was getting irrationally defensive over this. Deep down, he knew it was because Rick wasn’t just making fun of the idea of soulmates, but because he was also dismissing any possibility that they could have ever shared something as conceptually important.

“All you do is wear a fucking lab coat to announce to the world that you're a _scientist_ and already know _everything_ \- Instead of - Instead of seeking out problems and knowledge because you _don’t_ _know_! Y-You're not a scientist!”   

Rick’s laugh calmed into a strong smile, as he ignored the jabs at his identity. Morty fumed for not being able to get a rise out of his grandfather, who placed his flask down, and ruffled the strands of hair on Morty’s head, before pausing to look at his grandson. His eyes focused on the teen for a long moment.

Morty hated the way Rick’s eyes glinted as he watched the brunette's reaction. It was comparable to how one would look at a kitten trying to walk, he thought Morty was being cute.

“I just wish you’d take me seriously for once!”

“I'm treating this with the utmost seriousness, Morty!” Rick teased, “Here, let’s put it to the test. - disprove your hypothesis.”

With one hand still buried in Morty’s tresses, Rick lifted his other to catch Morty’s chin, before leaning into the boy, and still smiling, pressed their lips together.

They held the kiss for a long moment, before Rick pulled away, and angled Morty’s chin to lock blue-green hazel eyes against electric cobalt-blue. Rick smirked as his eyes shimmered from the depths of his thoughts, but reticent as ever, he continued to hold their faces inches apart while delivering his assessment.

 

“Your dumb hypothesis is more art than science, Morty.”

 

Rick gently released his hold on the teen and rolled back to his place, leaving Morty in silent euphoric shock.

 

“But then, I guess that makes you the _actual_ scientist, here.”

 

***

 

 

Morty felt his body emerge from the portal a bit more disoriented than his previous experiences. His stomach flipped with nausea and his head spun with feelings of vertigo.

The roars and crashes of ocean waves thundered against his eardrums as Morty’s senses attempted to re-orient themselves. The wind that whipped around his face tasted of salt, and as his vision came into focus, he realized he was taking in a beautiful night sky set against an ocean cliffside.

Past the cliffs and against the horizon, the moon and stars mirrored themselves over the surface of the water creating a seamless portrait between the earth and sky in what could be mistaken for something close to eternity. 

Morty stared at the presentation in awe, before catching movement from his peripherials. He turned his head from gazing at the stars and saw him.

Nearly his entire life, Morty had felt himself being silently drawn by the stronger pull of the universe. He never understood, and always questioned why, and as he jumped through the portal, he wondered what massive amounts of energy the universe would need to grant his wish. 

Then, as the fundamental laws of the universe rewarded the brevity of his jump, shaping an entirely new reality so that Morty could find a life with the person he loved - He believed a secret of the cosmos revealed itself: The universe had been pulling him to this moment all along.

As his heart beat with the pattern of a focused compass, and his eyes gravitated towards the person whom he loved from the very fibers of his being...he knew.  

His mouth fell open as he caught the unmistakable mess of blue hair moving along the cliffs. Rick paused to look up at the stars, taking a long drag of his cigarette before flicking it to the ground. He hesitated a moment, before jumping over the railing like a lithe cat, and listlessly held onto the rails behind him. He tested his weight against rusty metal, leaning over the swirling ocean and jagged rocks below.

And Morty knew.

He knew what Rick was contemplating. The portal had brought him to this moment and although incomprehensible, Morty intuitively understood why, and he ran in the direction of his heart, grabbing hold of the stranger just as his hands left the rails.

He caught Rick by surprise with a running hug from behind, and tightly wrapped his arms around the man's waist. The young adult quickly pulled Rick back against the railing, and buried his head into the taller man's spine. He felt his heart slam against the interior of his own chest, as he broke into a nervous sweat, realizing how close he had been to watching Rick throw himself off a cliff only moments after catching sight of him.

Everything felt surreal as he heaved breaths from sprinting to make it in time. He fought back tears, as he breathed in the strange but familiar scent through Rick's bomber jacket. The leather smelled of cigarette smoke and chemicals, but it was the same. 

He couldn't explain it, but the moment in which he thought of him, he knew. The feeling reverberated though his being - the person he loved on the other side of the portal was now gone. The surge of emotion in which he was suddenly overwhelmed, combined with the thought of _this_ person before him dying by his own hand. Morty began to shake as he heaved tears from something deep within him. He pulled Rick closer towards him, so afraid to let him go as he simultaneously grieved for the loss of his older self from another timeline.

Rick cursed and lifted his arms, trying to turn and see the person who flung themselves at him and was now sobbing without restraint. Morty only held on tighter, shook his head, and yelled at the stranger.

“You - Fucking idiot!”

“Who the fuck are you! D-do you mind? I'm trying to slip peacefully into voi-.”

“That jump's not going to kill you!”

Morty shouted at the stranger who did not yet know him. He echoed Rick’s own words as he wondered if this was how the scientist had originally known what to say to him. He swore he felt Rick's scowl through the wall of flesh between them.

“Wh- First you throw yourself around me to _stop_ me from jumping, A-A-And now you’re challenging my fucking conviction...I don't give a _fuck_ what you think, pal!”

Morty smiled through tears at the familiar personality, and allowed himself to retort as if the banter between them were second nature and always had been.

“I didn't waste your time, and got to the fucking point.”

“- Yeah, which is?”

“Nobody exists on purpose, nobody belongs anywhere, and everyone is gonna die - but when you face that...when you face your own death, you get to present yourself with having the choice. You get to put yourself in control of it. M-makes it all feel a lot less scary Y'know - knowing that whatever happens... it was still something you choose.”

Rick struggled against the late teen, growing irritated.  

“No offense, but your kind of - You're a weird fuckin' kid throwing some major stranger danger vibes. Y-You’re sitting back there, bawling over the life of a nobody. I-I Mean - What kind of fucked up life experiences -“

“- I’m the one who jumped!”

Rick fell silent as Morty quietly cried behind him steeped in understanding.

_In this reality, I'm the one who jumped._

Rick stilled, and leaned his body against the railing, pressing into the arms of the person behind him. Morty felt a pair of hands tenderly fold over his own, as they remained desperately locked around Rick's torso. The Stranger gazed up at the stars as he patiently waited for the soft sounds of Morty's sobs to fall quiet. A long uninterrupted silence stretched between the two as they shared a moment of understanding that existed for no one else. 

Rick's voice cut through the tranquil night with a heavy sigh. 

“You got a light?”

Morty nodded into Rick’s back, but made no other motion. Rick growled in frustration.

“Kid, you can let me go. I fuckin' need a smoke. I-I’m not gonna jump! A-At least not until after I get a good look at your lil' fuckin' creep ass...Okay?”

Morty hesitantly released him. Rick flipped back over the railing with an elegance that seemed ethereal. He rose next to Morty and stared the boy down. Even at 24, Rick still towered above him. He gave Morty an unimpressed once over as the brunette nervously avoided his eye contact. Rick caught Morty's chin between his fingers and Blue-green hazel met an electric cobalt-blue as they stared into each other.

“...Huh.” was all Rick said.

Morty fidgeted in his pocket and fished out his lighter. Their skin brushed for a moment and Morty jumped at the contact, causing Rick to smirk at the stranger's sudden nervousness, before leaning into his hand to light his cigarette.

“How old are you, kid?”

Morty internally laughed that a 24 year old version of his grandfather still called him "kid".

“E-Eighteen.”

“Isn’t 18 a little old to be running away from home?”

Morty didn't answer and instead, averted Rick's piercing stare. Rick had been profiling him. He nervously shifted his bags, trying to think of the best way to respond. He supposed that being a runaway was a more palpable story than time travel. Rick saved him from a reply by sensing Morty's discomfort and changed the subject. 

Rick frowned at the late teen as he blew a puff of smoke away from them, “You eat today?” 

Morty was still reeling from the rollercoaster of emotions within him. He shook his head and Rick grunted in disapproval.

“Louis’ diner’s not far from here, wha’dya say I buy us both something to eat?” 

Rick's act of kindness took Morty by surprise, and he found himself nodding in agreement before he could refuse. Rick's eyes shimmered as he lightly chuckled at Morty's reserved eagerness. He playfully ruffled his hair before pushing him off balance, and began to walk. 

"C'mon then. It's the best place to eat if you're at Land's End." 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm taking a lot of interpretive liberties about entanglement to argue for the idea soulmates in this fic, But there's some really cool discussions about the [quantum coherence of consciousness ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIyEjh6ef_8&t=109s) out there. 
> 
> Rick references that Rumi may have had [ Quantum Intuition, ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkVnnN0MjIE) a really interesting scientific concept that argues that people without formal training in the field, actually have a more intuitive grasp of the concepts of quantum physics. I'm am here for that.
> 
> While we are on the topic of intuition and interpretive liberties. I'm also playing with the concept of gravity in this fic. Stephen Hawking said "Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing." Gravity is the weakest of the forces in the universe, but has the largest effect. [ It is the force that holds the universe together, ](https://www.ted.com/talks/allan_adams_what_the_discovery_of_gravitational_waves_means) and there is still so much that is still unknown about it. I took liberties to play with the idea that Morty felt the gravitational pull of the universe his entire life, but had dismissed it as suicide ideation. This is a lot of liberties for the sake of metaphor and this story, and I'm not arguing that if you feel suicidal, that the universe is calling you. 
> 
> I will acknowledge that I basically claimed meeting your hypothetical entangled soulmate would release enough cosmic energy to essentially create an entire universe. I'm not apologizing for that scientific BS loosley based on [ Conservation of Energy ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PplaBASQ_3M), and you can fight me. 
> 
> Also not apologizing for using entanglement theory to drop the idea of a [ soulmate sixth sense. ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extrasensory_perception) check out 
> 
> Although I'm using the idea of[ "Spooky Action at a Distance" ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYd8XwFcBwk) to imply some sort of soulmate entanglement or connection, this fic intentionally leaves itself way open for reader inpterpretation. Did Rick's original consciousness somehow entangle with another version of himself, allowing him to be psuedo-reincarnated into the Rick who Morty met? Or is the Rick he just met the actual hypothetical soulmate, and Morty only sensed original Rick's death because he had already entangled their particles together from using the portal gun. Do all Ricks and all Mortys, share some sort of an entangled soul that is rooted in the central finite curve? Maybe soulmates don't actually exist and our unreliable narrator Morty just wants to believe they do. I think the cosmic horror of any of these interpretations lies understanding that this both is and isn't our original Rick, but trying to discern where that line falls and why. I'll leave it up for you to.


	5. Knock Three Times

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Knock Three Times_ was the #10 song on _Billboard_ Year-End Hot 100 singles of 1971

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tws & Tags for this chapter: Homelesness, Dacryphilia

Although Rick never bat an eye at Morty’s ‘ _bitching and moaning’_ when he was in physical pain, he’d always had a weakness for seeing the boy genuinely cry. Morty always suspected it was because Rick himself, never cried. He even wondered, at times, the scientist was even capable of shedding tears.

On the few occasions that Rick had caught Morty engaged in such an act, he would follow the routine of resting his hands on Morty's shoulders, sinking to his eye-level, and analyzing the display of human emotion for a few moments before deciding how to act. Morty figured that seeing tears was just another weird object of fascination for the scientist, because sometimes he would roll his eyes with a shrug and push Morty away, telling him to ' _get his fucking shit together’_ , and other times his grandfather would embrace him in a tight, silent and comforting hug.

At the end of one adventure in particular, Rick's frustration boiled over into shouting, and Morty's frustration boiled over into tears.

Rick dragged Morty by the arm back to the spaceship, throwing him into his seat and slamming the door behind him. As they broke the planet’s atmosphere, Rick flipped the switch to autopilot, and turned to deliver a lecture to the teen on his stupidity. The space within the ship reverberated with the sounds of Rick’s livid voice as he maddeningly flailed his hands and shouted at the teen. Spittle fell on Morty’s face as he sat in the wake of Rick’s anger. He had seriously fucked up this time, and had almost gotten them both killed.

Rick had yelled at Morty before, but never like this. At the edge of Rick's erratic voice Morty sensed a tone of desperation and fear.  

The teen hung his head in resignation as he continued to listen to his grandfather effortlessly point out every mistake that Morty had made - as if that knowledge wasn’t already glaringly obvious to the teen himself. He knew, even better than Rick, how much of a fuck-up he was, because he knew that today wasn’t some sort of exception. It was the rule. Morty did what he had always done, and Rick was right. They survived on a gamble.

Rick was yelling at him because even though Morty was a piece of space-shit, his grandfather still cared about him, and was afraid to lose him. He passively listened to Rick's shouting, considering all the various ways he regretted holding his grandfather back.     

Rick swore aloud, and fell quiet when he glanced down to notice that Morty had been crying. Then he placed his hands on the teen’s shoulders and gave them a slight squeeze. After a moment, he blew out a puff of air, wearing a regretful expression as he cupped the brunette’s face and he brushed away his tears. He pressed a thumb into the liquid as it streamed down Morty's cheeks. As he studied Morty, the teen began verbalizing an apology.

“I-I’m Sor-.”

“-Don’t - fuckin’ apologize, Morty, when you have nothing to apologize for. If anyone should be - Fuck. I’m not mad, Morty. I’m just - I was just...afraid, Okay?”

“I know, Rick.” Morty sniffed, “I just...wish I didn't always mess stuff up for you.”

Morty acknowledged Rick’s effort to backpedal. He appreciated the gesture, but it didn’t change the fact that he was still deadweight to the scientist. Rick moved out of his chair and knelt down in front of Morty before giving him a quick kiss on his forehead and pulling him into a warm embrace. 

“I can’t lose you, Morty. You're all I have.”

Morty leaned his forehead into the dip of Rick's neck as they hugged and he listened to his grandfather confess that Morty was everything to him. Morty felt his tears continue to fall as he fisted the coat of the person who continuously suffocated his thoughts.

He wanted Rick to make him feel like he was worth something.

He always wanted more than his grandfather was willing to give.

It hurt too much sometimes - to accept these lifelines that Rick tossed to Morty at the threshold of his breaking point. Today, it was too much to feel his grandfather's protective embrace holding onto him as if he were something of value worth the effort of protecting.

He breathed in the scent of the man he loved. He knew how much he wanted this, but accepting it in broken pieces felt too much like he was trying to hold onto shards of glass. He softly spoke his grandfather's name, and painfully pushed the older man away from him, rubbing at puffy, reddened eyes.  

Rick’s breathing had become low and even, and a dark hum escaped his lips as he allowed himself to be pushed away. He remained focused on Morty, watching him with a bright, piercing gaze that quietly stirred feelings of desire in the teen. The atmosphere was thick, and hung between the two for a moment before Rick pulled himself from his thoughts and quickly changed his demeanor. He turned to rise back into his seat, switching off the autopilot to allow himself the distraction of flying the ship. Rick’s focus remained on the path ahead while he continued to backpedal their conversation. 

“...What I meant was out here. _Out here,_ I can't lose you.”

The only response was a silence interrupted by the the soft sounds of Morty's sniffs and hiccups. Rick growled in frustration at Morty's silent treatment as he struggled to pull his tattered lab coat off and throw it in the back of the ship. He scrubbed his hands through his hair, and made an effort to lower his voice as he gestured to the stars surrounding them. 

“What do you want me to tell you, Morty? Hell yeah, you mess shit up and are a constant pain in my ass - so what! This is - it's one of those hard facts of life, Morty - you don’t get it because you’re not some dead-end road kid growing up on the streets, but the rules are the same in space.”

Morty continued to face away from Rick and watch the stars outside the windshield pan across his view. The hypnotizing motion had helped to calm him down. Rick quickly glanced to Morty, before glaring past the windshield into the void of space.    

“It’s _a lot_ easier to survive out here when you have someone you can trust to watch your back - like a partner in crime. I trust you with my life, Morty, y-you’re my best accomplice.”

Morty turned his head to view the scientist, who wore an encouraging smile. Morty often imagined that Rick had a heart of glass. He gave away the pieces of what remained as if they were still whole, fully knowing Morty would be cut if he dared reach out to grab hold of them.

Rick cast out the glistening lifelines fully knowing that Morty would reach out for them regardless.

“It uh...goes without saying, I made the decision to trust you enough _to_ even make the stupid mistake that almost got us both fuckin' killed in the first place - so just  - just tell me you’ve learned some sort of lesson here. You’re not gonna do something that stupid again.”

As the ship carried them home, Rick switched on the interdimensional radio, allowing music to fill the thick silence that sat heavy between them. Eventually Morty's tears died, and lighthearted conversation filled the ship; however, the tension of the adventure remained. Rick had never been good at letting things go. He steered the conversation back into argumentive territory, and mid-conversation about the influences of G-Wave in Cosmos Redshift 7, Rick casually slipped in an off-handed accusation of Morty using ' _underhanded manipulation tactics to high road'_ him by crying.

Morty was caught off guard at the nonchalant insinuation. His grandfather had his hang ups, but this one was too oddly-specific to simply roll his eyes and shrug at.

“I wasn’t crying to high road you, Rick!"

Morty struggled to find the words. Even to alien lifeforms, he never had to explain _why_ he cried.  

"I just felt bad...like, I dunno, sometimes it just feels _really_ good to cry, y’know?” Morty swirled his hands searching for the right descriptor, “It’s like some sort of...emotional detox - like a release.”  

Rick had procured his flask and was confidently nursing it as he continued to give morty an accusing glare.

“Y-Yeah, I get it Morty - crying is some sort of emotional orgasm for you - that's not what I'm talking about." 

Rick avoided Morty's gaze. "Even if you didn’t know what was happening, Mo-OUGH-ty, it’s still -" Rick grew frustrated at his inability to explain " - Mother nature’s a real fucking...can be a manipulative bitch.” Rick rolled his eyes at Morty’s questioning gaze as if what he were talking about should have been obvious. 

“Emotional tears, Morty, the chemical composition is completely different...on top of being the natural pain killers that give you that _sweet release_ , they're noticeable _by design_...more proteins and lipids - They’re thicker, so they adhere to your skin and catch light..."

Rick trailed and growled into another sip of his flask, “T-The whole point is to weigh the odds of a social interaction in your favor by exploiting reactive states and social bonding. Wh-when you cry like that, Morty, you’re sending subliminal signals to any sentient creature in close proximity that say, ‘this situation is beyond my ability to cope, please help me.’"

“So...it's just how humans say, ‘Wubba Lubba Dub Dub’,” Morty lightly joked, holding a chuckle in the back of his throat. Of course his grandfather would build an entire scientifically neurotic fixation around something that he was unable to do. 

Rick dismissed his lighthearted comparison.

“No, because _language,_ Morty _,_ is a linguistic structure designed for the purpose of  communication, _tears_ are just nature’s way of being a subtle fuckin’ cock tease.”

Morty snorted at Rick's defense. The older man grumbled and told his grandson to fuck off with a huff, now ready to drop the conversation.

“Look, I~it wasn't even that important, I was just stating the obvious,” he deflected.  

It wasn't a surprise to Morty that something as obvious as shedding a few tears would be _anything_ _but_ when it came to Rick Sanchez.

Morty considered the strange fixation as Rick had described it to him. Just because Rick had the ability to cold read what kind of tears Morty cried didn’t mean the teen had some sort of hidden ulterior motive behind the act of shedding them. If anything, Rick's ability made Morty _more_ honest. His expression softened as he offered advice to his grandfather for a change. 

“Rick, I think you're overthinking this. Being able to cry...in an emotional way like you said - and being able to respond to that? It’s not some sort of delicate chemical con job of nature. It’s just an important part of being, y’know...human.”

"Y _ou cry,"_ Rick quickly retaliated, "because the universe hasn't fucked you over enough that you can still think it gives a shit about you. Trust me Morty, you're gonna hit that point in life, like the rest of us where you realize that nobody owes you shit, and crying isn't gonna help, so enjoy it while it lasts."

Morty wondered where he had messed up again. He studied the change in Rick’s tone with confusion as his grandfather held his flask and poked an authoritative finger at him.

 _For a_ **_human_** _, who cried, this would be obvious. But it hadn't been for Rick..._

Morty had just implied that his grandfather was lacking in something essential to being considered human. He internally winced at the realization, and tried to correct his earlier statement.

"What I meant was that, uh, I just think...when you can trust someone with seeing you cry, it makes life feel a lot easier...Because when people cry real emotional tears like that, it's because they can't hold themselves together any more...and I think that's the moment when they need to be able to trust someone the most.” 

Rick's expression grew cold and distant.

“I’ve never needed anyone.”

Before Morty could respond, Rick turned the interdimensional radio up, ending the conversation.

 

***

 

“Listen, sorry if I uh, you know - freaked you out back there.” Rick’s easy expression fell on Morty. 

He took a sip of his coffee and curiously studied the young adult. “I seriously thought I was alone,” Rick teased, ”you weren’t in the bushes stalking me or anything like that, were you?”

Morty considered Rick’s playful insinuation, and quietly realized that he _actually had_ just become the literal fucking _definition_ of a creep.  

The young adult had successfully avoided eye contact as Rick walked him to Louis’ diner. Morty had a feeling that Rick had caught onto his avoidance tactics, and had pointedly sat directly across from him in the dining booth. Morty attempted to avoid his brilliantly vibrant and luminescent blues, which sat against skin yet to be weathered by the hands of time.

Instead, he found his throat suddenly parched when he caught himself intently studying the action of Rick’s lips pressing against the curve of his steaming ceramic mug followed by the action of Rick's Adam's apple bobbing with the hard swallow of its contents. Morty licked his far too dry lips and mimicked the hard swallow, realizing how thirsty he was.

He swore under his breath and felt his ears turn red in embarrassment. Morty had only ever once seen a photo of his younger grandfather, and even then the man was in his late 30s. The presentation sitting before him was something else entirely, and Morty firmly decided that staring directly at Rick Sanchez at 24 was the equivalent of staring directly at the sun. The young man before him could only be taken in through careful, indirect glances. He nervously shifted his eyes as his finger tapped against the tabletop, wishing he had a cigarette. 

“No! I uh, you didn't - I mean…i-it's okay.”

Morty gulped his own scalding hot coffee in an attempt to distract himself and focus on literally _anything else_ that didn’t make him seem like more of a creep than he already was - which already was, he reminded himself, a stranger who had time travelled to arguably one of Rick’s most vulnerable moments in life to silently profess his eternal love as he cried a river of emotionally charged tears.

Morty had no fucking idea how would he even _begin_ to explain to Rick what a fucking creep he actually already was.

“Won’t kill you to relax a bit, kid.”

Rick gave a crooked grin as he pulled out Morty’s lighter to ignite a fresh cigarette in the restaurant. Morty's heart jumped at the gesture of smoking in a public space, wondering if it was still legal, or if Rick was openly disregarding rules and becoming more attractive by the minute. Morty looked around. The diner was fairly empty, and he didn't see anyone else doing the same, so he wasn't sure.

Rick took a drag to burn a cherry, then offered it to Morty across the table. He happily picked the cigarette from his fingers, not realizing how much be he had been needing a smoke until it was offered. 

He had only packed things he was certain would not create a time catastrophe, deciding it would be safest to replace any commercial items once he arrived. He had actually forgotten to remove the ever present lighter from his coat pocket, now resting in Rick’s hands. So far it hadn't caused some kind of rip in the fabric of time-space. 

Morty took a long drag from the cigarette, needing to calm down and stop thinking for a minute. The smoke was sweet and heavy in his lungs, leaving a fragrance that smelled of spices. Morty looked at the cigarette and shot a curious glance at Rick. Their eyes met and Morty coughed at the burning he felt in his chest that had not been caused by smoke. Rick grinned as Morty quickly looked away from him. 

“They’re cloves.”

Morty examined the cigarette between his fingers before offering it back to Rick, but the man pulled out a second cigarette for himself.

“Take it. Look like you fuckin’ need it.”

Morty mustered up the courage to look at him again. Rick wore a shit-eating grin as he watched Morty’s behaviour, as if he already knew he was something enjoyable to look at. He spread both his arms across the back of the diner booth, giving Morty not only permission, but an open invitation to continue his gratuitous indulgent creep-staring.

Morty politely excused himself to the restroom, drawing the line at popping a pervy creep-tent in his pants. He had been completely unprepared to confront a Rick who openly made sexual advances to a perfect stranger-to-him. Morty deep-breathed until his hot-blooded arousal cooled down, and when he returned he tried his best to look at everything in the diner but Rick while they waited for their food. Rick continuously blew smoke in his face trying to get his attention. Getting Morty to glance over to him had become some sort of silent game to him.

Mortys eyes wandered around his surroundings trying to gather information about where he was. He was in god-knows-where America, and didn’t even know the time. The radio hummed from the open grills in true americana fashion, and the smell of diner food wafted over to him. His stomach growled in anticipation.

They had picked a corner booth set against a window that overlooked the oceanside they had just come from. The clouds had quickly moved into the scene, obscuring the beautiful night. Morty grew irritated, suspecting that this was actually why his grandfather had been so smart. Cell phones didn’t exist to tell him everything he needed to know at a moment's notice.

The waitress brought their food to the table and the pair extinguished their cigarettes. Against Morty’s hesitations, Rick had ordered the steak and egg special for the both of them. The plate slid in front of Morty, and in addition to feeling like he had been starving, he was grateful that they _both_ had something to focus on. Morty eagerly lifted his fork to eat, but Rick stopped him before he could take a his first bite.

“Hey! Hang on - how long's it been?

“What?”

“Since you ate last?”

“Jeez, I dunno, maybe a day, why?” 

“If it's been too long and you eat too fast, your starving _calaca_ ass is gonna reject it. I might as well throw my money in the toilet.” 

“That can happen?”

“Why the fuck else would I be askin’... take it slow, yeah?”

Morty nodded and carefully ate. He caught glances of Rick eating and chuckled to himself, dismissing the man’s questioning gaze.

Rick's eating habits were ritualistic. If it were in the ship, he was entirely sloppy in consuming his meals, but there was something about a set table that caused him to eat with a perfect, graceful posture. Morty never asked Rick about it - it was just one of those quirks he noticed over time. Morty was impressed to see it had gone this far back. 

Morty caught himself staring again. This time at Rick’s posture and a jawline that could cut diamonds. He redirected his attention to his food as he felt the stirrings of arousal. They didn’t speak again until their plates were nearly empty and the pace of their eating had slowed. A question had been hanging on Morty’s mind, and he decided to try and get to know his younger grandfather.   

“Do, you uh, wanna talk about it?”

“About what?” Rick raised his eyebrow, before realizing Morty was talking about his earlier Peter Pan stunt. He rolled his eyes and dismissed the question.

“Do _you_ wanna tell me about _yourself?_ ” Morty's panicked reaction was an answer in itself, and Rick scoffed, “Yeah, that's what I thought. Y-you don't even know my name - how ‘bout we start with that?” Rick bit into a piece of steak. 

“Rick,” he offered, patiently waiting a few moments, before interrupting Morty’s blank stare, “...usually when you give someone your name, they’re supposed to return the favor. Maybe I’ll just call you _Major Tom_.”

Morty had been lost in his thoughts of the night, and of holding this person so intimately only a short while ago. It already felt so much farther away as he heard the stranger offer his name.

“Fuck, s-sorry. I'm M-morty. 

“Morty,” Rick tested the name on his tongue. “...You sure you're doing all right, kid?” 

“It's just...it’s been a long day.”

“Yeah, it fuckin’ looks like it… Do you even have something figured out for tonight at least?”

“Uh. I uh, ye-” Morty considered lying. Rick’s glare was immediate and scathing. 

“Before you answer that, I'm gonna warn you - I-I take it as a personal insult when liars who don't have the talent think I'm dumb enough to be lied to.”

Morty resigned. “I was planning to find a park or something? I have a wool blanket…”

“I’m asking because that teary eyed look you’ve been wearing tonight? It looks wa~y too fuckin’ good on you.”

Morty choked as Rick chased his words by dragging his tongue along his bottom lip. Morty, against his best intentions, followed the movement, watching the wet muscle suggestively click against Rick’s teeth and flick in his direction. 

_Did his tongue have a piercing?_

Rick leaned across the table to brush a thumb across Morty’s swollen cheeks. Rick tsked, “If I left you on some park bench, you’d get picked up by either a trafficker, a pimp, or the fuzz, in that order. -  and they’d want you wearing those tears permanently...I like the thought of you crying those eyes out just for me a _whole_ bunch more, baby.” Rick stated in a matter-of-fact way as he let his hand fall from the boy’s face and moved back into his seat. “Go back home, kid...these streets’ll fuckin’ ruin you.”

Morty caught his reflection in the glass window. His eyes were still swollen and red from having cried so violently. He looked like a hot mess.

_Was that sort of thing attractive to some people?_

Morty wondered if his grandfather had been hung up on tears because of some sort of crying kink. The younger version of Rick openly admitted as much. He burned a shade darker at Rick’s intimidation tactics mixed with his not-at-all-subtle advances. Scaring a desired response out of Morty had been a standard play out of his grandfather’s book. Morty understood that Rick was just trying to scare him into returning home, but he still blushed.

“I don’t…” Morty held back emotion as he thought of Rick and the life he had left behind. In a way, he considered, he really _had_ run away. He had known there was no turning back.

“I don’t have a home...to go back to...”

Morty hadn’t fully comprehended the weight of his new reality in full until he heard himself verbalize it to Rick.

The booth fell silent as Morty struggled against the upcoming tide of rising emotions. He felt his eyes burn and begin to gloss over, but Morty bit his tongue to stave off anymore tears. No one was coming to help him. Not this time. He didn’t want to cry anymore tonight, especially with the newfound knowledge that Rick potentially got off on it. Rick called the waitress over and ordered a slice of apple pie à la mode. He placed the dessert between them and passed him a fork. 

“Listen, I don’t make a habit of picking up strays, but I think anyone can see you ran away without having any fucking idea of what you're doing...if you want, you can crash at my place for a few days...figure your shit out.”

Morty felt his lip quiver as he took the fork. Rick had no reason to be so nice to someone he barely knew. Morty mulled his answer over, wondering if it was a loaded offer as he imagined what Rick might want in exchange for a place to sleep for a few nights.

“How do I know I can trust you, and you won’t – I don’t know, snuff me in some alley?”

Morty wasn't entirely convinced Rick _wouldn't_ do that.  

“You don’t...and it’s good that you’re hesitating,” Rick smiled. “There might just be some hope for you yet, Morty.”

Rick scooped a bit of ice cream onto his tongue and intentionally, slowly pulled the spoon from his mouth allowing the metal click against his tongue. _It was definitely pierced._

“If you’re choosing this life, everything’s a gamble from here on out, kid. You’re either going to roll the dice you have, or have them rolled for you.” 

“So then, why are you being so kind to me?” Morty genuinely asked the question. This wasn’t how Ricks acted. It wasn't how _Rick_ acted. He never offered to help. 

“You're the kid who jumped and I'm the one who ran away - two lost souls who found each other in the chaos. You’re not gonna survive on the streets alone, and I’m just rolling the dice. So let's share some life experiences and help each other out.”

“Do you live on the streets, now?”

Rick grinned at the question, “Not anymore.”

Rick and Morty left the diner, and walked for a long while along the oceanside making light conversation. They almost missed their cable car as it pulled away from it's stop heading deeper into the city. Morty nearly tripped on the jump, but Rick caught his hand and pulled him up into the moving boxcar and into his chest. Morty instinctively pressed himself into the familiar embrace as the man wrapped a steadying arm around him. After a moment he remembered that they were supposed to be strangers and he was a creep, and deeply blushed before pulling away. Rick heartily laughed at him and made a comment that he was lucky to run away to one of the safest cities to be a queer.

Morty’s mouth fell open as he realized they were riding _the_ iconic cable car. The ocean, the weather - everything fell into place as he absorbed the city they passed by. He was in 1971, San Francisco, with 24-year-old Rick Sanchez.

He gripped the pole to steady himself at the revelation.

“Have you always lived here?”

“Nah, I came out for the _Summer of Love_ with the hippies, but eventually fell in with the beatniks.”

Morty laughed at the mental image of Rick being a hippie with a flower crown. 

“Did you remember to wear flowers in your hair?”

“Ugh, that joke is so fucking overdone. The times, they are a changin'.”

Rick referenced the Bob Dylan song in response before explaining.

“People stayed for the overall relaxed culture the city has about drugs, music and sex, but the gentle people have long since moved on - especially if you're in the Tenderloin – nothing but hard drugs and harder people there.” 

Rick motioned that the upcoming spot was their jump. They hopped off the moving cable car and Rick led Morty through a few blocks on foot, until they came across a yellow Victorian townhouse on Valencia St. Morty stared at the beautiful structure, enjoying his imaginings of Rick being a queer in _the_ queer city, and living it up in a painted lady. Until Rick loudly coughed to redirect his attention and gestured to the van parked on the street in front of it.  

This was more accurate.

“Morty, meet _Stella_ ,” Rick kissed the metal and cooed at the vehicle as he pressed himself into the navy blue paint and whispered sweet nothings to it in Spanish, _“Ah, mi cielito, eres mi cancion.”_

_(My little sky, you are my song!)_

“You fuckin’ _named_ it?” Morty blurted out, and blushed at hearing the Spanish he didn't understand pouring out of Rick's mouth.  

“Is that a Westie?”  

“I’m glad you asked because no, _She,_ ” Rick defensively corrected. “Is a ‘68 _Rickstie -_ my life, my lab, and my love shack.”

Rick pointed to the front of the van where he'd removed the Volkswagen logo and replaced it with an R in a circle.

“Fact of life, kid, nothing gets you laid as much as telling someone you sleep in a vehicle you’ve named.”

Rick suggestively wiggled his eyebrow at Morty as he slid open the door and climbed in.

Morty followed with a nervous swallow, expecting the same sporadic mess that he had become familiar with in the spaceship. However, this space was tidy and well kept. The small table had been pulled out, and a workdesk permanently set up on it. Books and items were neatly shelved in their places. In the driver's area a pair of black dice hung from the mirror, and a bobble star ornament rested on the dashboard with some folded maps. Rick pulled out some blankets from the cupboard space and tossed them into the sleeping area of the van.   

“The bottom bed’s the nicer one, but we could raise the top if you wanted.”

He stretched his body out to flip on the small radio.

_I beg your pardon...I nev-_

Rick changed the station, deciding on one which was playing popular 70s hits. Morty mentally corrected himself. Current hits. The mellow beat and brass notes of _Knock Three Times_ filled the van.

 

Morty nervously stood in the small space of the van as Rick sprawled himself across the bottom mattress. He folded his arms behind his head, and tossed some bedroom eyes to Morty.

Fuck.  

“C’mere, kid,” the husky voice encouraged the young adult.

“I’m not gonna bite...unless you’re into that kind of shit. Not gonna lie, you kind of look like you might be.”

Morty gulped as his gut stirred from a mixture if nervousness and instinctual arousal. He hesitantly inched closer to Rick, indecisively on the fence about how he wanted to proceed with the situation unfolding before him.

“You're a flighty one.”

Rick's hand reached out and caught Morty’s wrist to pull the brunette on top of him.

“No problem. I’ll take lead... Knock three times, kid.”

He chuckled at Morty's flustered expression at the sudden closeness. Morty nervously glanced around, realizing how small the space surrounding them had become. Rick held their bodies close and stroked the side of Morty’s cheek. His thumb traced the line Morty’s tears had followed. Rick clicked his tongue and hungrily purred.

Rick’s breath brushed against Morty's lips as the brunette shifted, feeling the warmth of their bodies pressing tightly together and his jeans beginning to tent. As he shifted to adjust himself he unintentionally moved against Rick, brushing against his hardened length. He was rewarded with an unapologetically satisfied moan from the younger version his grandfather. Rick’s eyes shimmered in the dull light as they held eye contact. He hummed in satisfaction of their new position of facing toward one another.

“I like you mu~ch better like this.”

Rick reached past Morty and threaded his fingers through the brunettes hair, moving to pull him closer and claim a kiss.

Morty tensed, pulling away in a heavy panic. He wanted this, but he also didn’t because he _knew_ Rick. He didn’t know if a younger Rick would freak out like the older Rick had done, but he did know that Rick had referred to himself as being a “tom cat” in his younger years. Morty didn’t want to end up as a one night stand with him.

He accepted that he was being a fucking creep as he performed mental calculations to optimize his chances with this not-a-stanger. Even so, Morty felt that, overall, the night had moved too fast for him. 

Morty was exhausted, but he wasn't exhausted enough to make the mistake of allowing _this_ version of Rick to give something to him in pieces. He didn't want to be some sort of cheap fuck in the back of his van.

Morty continued to pull himself away, internally panicking that Rick might kick him out on the street for not putting out.

“S-s-sorry, I just -”

“Hey, hey, hey, it’s okay.” Rick sat up with an expression of concern on his face. “You don’t have to apologize - You didn’t do anything wrong, kid. Looks like I was just picking up the wrong signals.”

“No, you were right -” Morty caught himself at correcting Rick. Why had he just admitted that? Now it would be even harder to explain.

“I just, I don’t know right now, I’m sorry because I don’t know – if I want this, want you, like this, right now.” Morty explained in circles to the man.

“Morty.” Rick spoke his name a bit forcefully, and the boy's attention instantly focused on the baritones of his voice like it was Pavlov's bell. His expression looked concerned and genuine. “It’s okay, kid. You’ve had a tough day - I was only on board with exploring each other a little if you were...don’t worry about it.”   

“You’re still gonna let me sleep here? Even though I didn’t –”

“Morty, I’m not asking you to whore yourself out for a fucking place to sleep tonight.”

Morty recognized the change in tone that suggested he had said something wrong. Rick grew irritated at what Morty had just insinuated about him. He quickly hopped out of the bed and moved to step out of the van.

“You can crash in here tonight. I’ll be in the house - when you wake up in the morning, come on inside. I'll make coffee, and we can get your shit together.” Rick motioned to leave before turning back at Morty.

“Since we are making assumptions about each other – make a mess in my baby, or steal any of my shit, and you won't need that pretty little imagination, because I'll show you who I can be... Sweet dreams, kid.”

Rick slid the van door closed, leaving Morty alone with his thoughts for the first time since he had arrived in this dimension. The sound of  _Bob Dylan_ softlyfiltered out of the small radio. 

_How does it feel, how does it feel?_  
_To be on your own, with no direction home._  
_A complete unknown, like a rolling stone._

Morty let out a heavy sigh. He was irritated at the way Rick could so quickly shut down and change the atmosphere of a room. It was a gesture Morty was all too familiar with, and he wasn't excited to see it here, now. He wasn't sure what he expected, though.

This Rick was still his Rick after all.

He reached into his jacket to fish out the remaining halfie of his clove cigarette, before realizing that Rick had never returned his lighter. He exasperated, and with an unwanted erection, shouted in the van after him.

“Fucking lighter thief!” 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Really diving into the time travel theme here, and made a spotify playlist for the radio: [LHR's Rixties and 70's. ](https://open.spotify.com/user/qgd6gt9y4l98ubsslngy6a3ue/playlist/35oZyCvh8Siy6MtosbsIR7) All song's on this list released within a 4-ish year span of 1971.
> 
> Rick Mentioned that he originally came to San Francisco in '67 for the summer of love/season of the witch. [ Record Rick has a fic about that ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13338720/chapters/30535860), and made a playlist about it [ Rick's Psychedelic Acid Rock. ](https://open.spotify.com/user/qgd6gt9y4l98ubsslngy6a3ue/playlist/2UnhQhHz8zOvE1qFk1xSAE) So much of the Rick and Morty art style is inspired by psychedelic art, and I love it Gimme dat 4/20 sin!
> 
> [ The science behind the different kind of tears we cry, and why we cry ](http://time.com/collection/guide-to-happiness/4254089/science-crying/) is fucking crazy, and I HC so hard that Rick can look at tears and tell what kind they are.
> 
> More info on Rick's Crying Kink: To explain in more detail my HC for Rick's dacryphilia, it's triggered when he sees a person shed genuine emotional tears. This is because he's more or less forgotten what it's like to be able to cry so authentically. He correlates Morty's crying with a truly authentic gesture. Couple that with Rick's self-hatred, and his arousal is further heightened with the knowledge that Morty has cried authentic tears _for him._
> 
> Because Morty is able to cry so easily, In Rick's Mind, he represents a person who isn't 'broken' like him - someone who is not afraid of being honest, open and vulnerable to another human being. Rick doesn't want the streets to ruin Morty like they have ruined him, and it's why he tells him to go home. In his own mind, he desires to protect Morty from hardening, and it is this motivation that leads him to decide to pick up the stray Morty. (Hopefully my fic did a good job of getting this across, but I want to make it clear comment if you have questions or wanna talk HC's)


	6. Diffraction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“Bodies and Light act mutually upon one another...they emit, reflect, refract and reflect.”_  
>  –Isaac Newton

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heads up readers, this is a huge whiplash-y chapter. It’s length is about twice the size of the entire fic so far. I didn’t want to break it up, because the sections are meant to foil each other, that said, it’s broken into 12 small sections throughout marked by (***), so there should be plenty of stopping points if you need to take a break. Grab a blanket and warm beverages, cause we’re scratching the surface of Rick’s past, alongside memories of Old Rick, while also dealing with Morty’s clusterfuck of morning after emotions. (Hence the chapter title) 
> 
> TW’s for this chapter in order: homelessness, drugs, substance abuse, addiction, alcoholism, mention of attempted drug overdose, mention of suicide attempt, mentions of past child abuse and forced drug usage, prostitution, questionable coping mechanisms, unreliable narrators, mentions of past sexual assault, edgeplay and mentions of consensual non-con, mentions of self-harm, grief and loss.

“There's nothing to it, Morty, look – it's all numbers and patterns. Vibrational frequencies of oscillating strings. The design of the guitar’s already done half the work for you. Music is just an expression of mathematics kid, and math...”

His grandfather played a series of arpeggios down the guitar fretboard and clear notes rang out in resonance with a distinct pattern.

“...Is the clearest language we have for speaking with the universe itself. T-the fact that the laws of physics allow – or even mandate that a unifying cosmological language exist – it’s one of the most important and fuckin’ poetic things about the physical world.”

Rick handed the freshly tuned guitar off to Morty, who hesitantly plucked out a few notes on open strings.

“Aw jeez, Rick, if I speak music like I speak math I – I think I’m gonna need more strings.”

“All math does is give us a way to describe and measure space using numbers – you gotta think of it like learning a foreign language – first, you have to _want to_ speak it before you can decide if you’re any good at it – and that’s why we’re starting with music. Cause it’s a mathematical language that you already have an intuitive grasp of.”  

“Ugh, why can't you just heal my legs, like that time on the megaseed plan–”

“– Morty, stop asking me that. – You already know my answer, and your _bitching_ isn't gonna change it. _That_ time was an accident. This time, you _chose_ to break your fuckin’ legs.”

“–Y-you pushed me!”

After Morty had “jumped” off the rooftop of the Smith family household, he woke in the local hospital to a dislocated ankle, an open comminuted fracture on the tibia and fibula of each leg, and a cracked rib from his knee folding into his chest on impact. He’d undergone a surgery that he did not remember and woke to his grandfather sitting next to his bedside, informing him that he would heal the rib but Morty was going to let his leg bones heal naturally while Rick closely monitored their progress because _the best lessons in life are the hardest learned, Morty, and the lesson here is that existence is pain._

Morty exasperated on the couch with swollen and discolored legs propped on the coffee table. They were mounted in circular metal rigs that looked like something from _Edward Scissorhands,_ holding the pieces of his bones in alignment with transfixed pins and screws, while stitches sewed his skin into a seal. The constant itching sensation only made the teen more irritated with the man sitting next to him who had chosen to withhold the healing serum.

After a full day of dealing with mind-numbing interdimensional cable and Morty’s attitude in general, Rick had left the house for a few hours and later returned with an acoustic guitar, a pack of Aquila brand synthetic guitar strings, and the suggestion that they use the downtime for Morty to pick up an actual skill.

Rick defended himself against Morty’s accusation.

“Y-yeah, like you fuckin’ needed the extra hand – I'm serving time here with you, kid. _I_ can't take you on adventures until your legs are healed _either_.”

Morty channeled his frustration into a strum of the guitar strings in a G chord, while looking at the chord chart that Rick had propped up using the metal contraption of his legs, transforming them into a temporary paper holder.  

“But why do you want me to learn _math._ I’ve _never_ been good at math.”

“You’ve never been good at _school,_ Morty – bunch of hormonal teenagers running' around... A guy up front says, '2 + 2,' and the people in the back say, '4.' Then the bell rings and they give you two cartons of milk and ask what you have if you get two more – and the answer isn’t 4, Morty, the answer is diarrhea… because you’re lactose intolerant – That's what they don't teach you...”

Rick trailed as he harmonically tuned the strings of his own bass guitar using only his ears, and Morty watched in awe for a second time at the passive demonstration of his skill.

“...No, all you’ve learned, Morty, is how to plug numbers into a formula – you’ve learned how to say your ABC’s but you’ve never learned to speak the language with any sort of fluency.”

Rick mimicked the G chord on his electric bass guitar. The notes rang out together from a small amplifier that he had attached to the body of the instrument. He strummed again, letting it ring out so that Morty could produce a matching sound with his own instrument.

“It’s like learning chords but never getting around to the circle of 5ths. Sure, you’ll be able to play some music – and that’s great, but it’ll be a lot harder if you ever want to write your own song.”

Rick had “offered” to teach Morty how to play the guitar, but his ulterior motive was an introduction to mathematics, and with a brain clouded by painkillers, the teen had been far from eager to even make an effort at it. That was, until he saw the rare opportunity to spend quality time with his grandfather in a way that didn’t involve some life-threatening shady deal on an alien planet, or working some elaborate con, in which Morty was always _the guy._

Today, life had seemed to slow down and Morty relished the feeling of living out a somewhat quiet – _as quiet as the Smith household could get_ – existence with his grandfather. He breathed deep, smiling at being able to take in the rare moment of sharing a mundane slice of life experience with the older man.

“We’ll start with a simple song that you actually want to learn – give you a taste, then we’ll branch out into music theory and math later – Give me a song, kid. I’ll pull up the chords.”

“How about that _Hurt_ song by Johnny Cash?”

Morty had been thinking about the song since he had heard it playing on Rick’s phone in the hospital. It was  _the_ song for acoustic guitar, and it had probably inspired Rick to pick up the guitar and bring it home for Morty in the first place. Rick froze at the suggestion before refusing the request.   

“– Morty, you just – I don't know, it's just a suggestion here, but maybe we should stay away from the songs about heavy shit like _knowingly and voluntarily throwing your life away_ , for a bit.”

Morty fell silent. Although Rick _had_ ultimately pushed him, they both knew that teen would have jumped all the same. _Heavy shit_ was all he’d wanted to think about lately.

Morty leaned back into the couch, clutching the guitar in his grip. This whole musical approach to math felt like his grandfather was adding an unnecessary layer to an already difficult subject. He continued to grow frustrated at having to learn anything on top of learning to let his legs heal.

“Rick, what if I just wanted to play? What if I never wanted to write my own songs? – W-why couldn’t I just use formulas, and chord charts, if they work?”

“Because there is no easy way out in life, Morty.” The irritation in Rick’s voice grew.

“Ugh – but what does that life lesson have to do with _math, y’know_?” If there was some sort of connection that tied the universe, math, languages, and his broken legs together, he wasn’t following it.

“– The same thing it has to do with you wanting to fuckin’ jump off a roof at 14 –”  Rick’s voice snapped as he growled at the teen, before he calmed himself with an irritated huff. He was silent for a moment, gathering his thoughts, before offering a more collected answer.   

“Because all languages are about connection, Morty. Fluency is when you’re able to use that language to describe and measure those connections and whatever meaning you can find inside of them.”

Rick played aimless notes from his thoughts as he continued to speak.

“...and because I think the only way you’re gonna make it to my age, Morty, is if you start talking, in whatever language you can.”

Before Morty could respond, Rick began playing an improvised song on his bass, transcribing his thoughts into music. Morty listened, and understood and felt what his grandfather had meant in calling it a language. He sat back up, positioning his hands over his guitar, wanting to play alongside him, but too afraid he’d mess up the song. It was similar to how he always listened to his grandfather’s ideas, but rarely spoke – he’d never felt smart enough to participate in a conversation with him, but here Rick was, saying that everything he knew was merely fluency gained from experience and practice.

He glanced at Rick’s foot tapping with the rhythm, and Morty followed the beat, tapping out a steady percussion on the body of the guitar. Rick’s eyes shot to Morty with a wide grin before they closed, and the scientist immersed himself into the song as they began to play together, sharing a conversation without words.

The song ended with Morty enthusiastically smiling at his grandfather. Rick scrubbed the hair out of his own eyes and looked to his grandson with a tender smile that Morty knew was reserved only for him when he had done something exceptionally right.     

“I don’t think I’ll ever be truly fluent in math either, Morty, but on the nights I feel most alone, like chemical scum on a pale blue dot... conversations with the universe – trying to see those connections is what keeps me going.”

Morty looked down at his guitar as understanding began to well from within.

“...That's why I want to teach you how to play the guitar.”

Rick didn’t want his grandson to feel alone, and with a simple gesture, he was making an effort to connect with him. His grandfather, despite being terrible at expressing emotions, was trying to communicate with him in the various ways he knew how, and the overtones of all the languages he was using said the same thing: He had cared about Morty’s suicide attempt, and didn't want to lose him.

The teen quickly brushed away the water building in his eyes. Too many emotions had clashed inside of him at the understanding, and he didn’t know if he could explain to his grandfather exactly what their sudden presence had meant to him.

It had been such a quiet shift within him, but it was defining in a way that both terrified him, and reignited his will to want to keep living.

Rick didn't want Morty to leave him alone either.

His grandfather wanted to speak with him. Whatever he had wanted Morty to learn, he resolutely decided that he would try his best to learn it. It didn’t matter if it was music or math or some obscure lessons about life. Morty didn’t care as long as it was Rick who was teaching it to him.

Rick Sanchez was the language he wanted to be fluent in.

He pursed his lips, wanting to play something for the person sitting beside him who had reminded him what it felt like to not give up.

“Hey Rick, I think I know the song I wanna learn to play…” he began a bit more confidently after their playing together. “It’s still well uh, it still feels sad... but it’s hopeful y’know? It feels like – it feels like something real. Maybe it’s a love song, I don’t know… but it feels the same as I do today… like a new beginning.”

Rick gave a sly smile and nudged his arm from across the couch.

“Heh, well, not _my_ go-to, but love’s probably one of the greatest motivators to learn a new language – or anything for that matter, so milk it for all you can.”

Morty looked away from Rick, not sure why he was blushing, and nodded.

“Go ahead then, let’s hear what it’s called and we’ll have a conversation with the universe – I’ll teach you the language of math, and you can learn the clearest language humans have for love while we’re at it.”

  

***

 

_Fuck, it's cold._

Morty woke up in the early morning hours, just as the sky began its gradual transition of colors. He dug his own wool blanket from his duffel and balled himself under both of the blankets in an attempt to get himself warm. It was the middle of summer, but the oceanside bay in a cold metal vehicle felt much cooler, and he watched his breath spill out in hot streams, feeling like he had been misled by the variety of social media posts about westies and living the tiny life. They looked much warmer in the photographs than this. He peeked out the window of the van to see a thick sheet of fog passing around him, and briefly wondered, in a sort of surreal existential dread, if he were in some sort of limbo.

He motioned to grab for his cell phone to check the time before remembering that he no longer had one, because he was no longer in D-137. he was in D-137b, 55 years ago. The reminder of his new reality sent an alarm into his chest and he rose, unable to return to sleep. He sat up cross-legged with the blanket still wrapped around him and looked around the quiet space, trying to gather a picture of Rick's life in _Stella_.

Morty had always assumed Rick seemed more comfortable living out of his spaceship than he had been living out of the Smith house – _then again, who wouldn't be_. It seemed that Rick, however, had spent his youth living in a mobile home.

The entire space felt like a comforting embrace. Stella, as Rick had named it, projected a sense of shelter and safety that emanated a feeling of home. An essay about the recreational use of marijuana by Mr. “X”, who, Morty knew, would later be revealed as Carl Sagan, and a copy of “On the Road” by Jack Kerouac sat next to the bedside on the work table. Morty wasn't sure if it was the same copy, but Rick had the same book on a shelf in the lab in his original dimension. Curious, he picked it up and flipped through the first few pages, before returning it to its place, making a mental note to read it later if given the chance. 

From the corner of his eye, he caught sight of an acoustic guitar case, and remembered the day his grandfather insisted he learn to play. He smiled to himself at the memory of another one of his grandfather’s obscure life lessons, before a sudden, acute understanding seized his heart.

The ability would forever live within him, and for that, Morty would always think of it as a way for Rick to remain by his side. It was a connection he would always have to him, and if he continued to play – in some unspoken metaphysical way, he'd never be alone.

“ _I’ve given so much of myself to you. From every life skill you'll ever use, to your bad habits and pretentious fucking taste in music – I'll be in all of those things with you as long as you live...”_

His thoughts continued to linger on Rick, and their conversation from a few weeks back. He hadn’t realized how far they had progressed with being able to openly communicate with each other until the two memories had clashed within in his mind.  

_“If that's not love Morty, tell me what is?”_

His lip quivered as he understood how different everything would be from here on out. He quickly reached out and switched on the radio to mask the sounds that began falling out of him, biting the knuckle of his index finger in an attempt to catch them.

 

 _I've seen your face before,_  
_I've known you all my life._  
_And though it's new,_  
_your image cuts me like a knife._

He still didn't regret the decision to leave, but he nonetheless felt himself overflow with emotion at the sudden understanding that he could never go back. He would never see Rick again, even as he had strangely entered into the life of the same man he was grieving.

His throat burned with a suffocating lump as he understood that all he would ever have with Rick were the bittersweet connections he had made with him, and the thread of each one seemed to vibrate painfully within him like hot wire strings oscillating through his heart.

 _The neon from your eyes is splashing into mine._  
_It's so familiar in a way I can't define._  
_And now I'm home._  
_And now I'm home._  
_And now I'm home, to stay._

  
Everything that Rick had ever taught him would beautifully ache.  

And because Rick had taught him everything, the searing lesson burning itself into Morty was that his entire existence was painfully alive, and although the pain suggested otherwise, for the first time since meeting his grandfather in his own timeline, he felt truly and utterly alone in a way that could only be felt after having lost someone who had made him feel like he wasn’t.

“– Hey kid, I was wondering how long you were planning to sle– ”

The door slid open and interrupted Morty’s thoughts. He hastily turned away from the person standing in the doorway, trying to hide, but only making more obvious the fact that he had been quietly crying to himself beneath the sounds of the radio.  

Rick halted, and fell silent for a moment before softly climbing into the van to join him. Morty lifted his sleeve to quickly remove any trace of his tears, composing himself as best as he could. Rick carefully slid the door shut behind him to keep the warmth from escaping, before speaking in a playful tone to try and lighten the atmosphere with a wholly different topic, pretending as if he hadn't just walked in on Morty's moment of emotional weakness.

“Generally, when I wake someone up shirtless with some coffee I at least get a ‘good morning, baby’ out of it.”

Morty turned to glance at Rick as the man purposefully ignored making eye contact and pushed a steaming hot mug into his chest. Grateful for anything with warmth, Morty held it with both hands and took a sip before clutching it like a small heater, surprised to find that It had been made exactly how he preferred. Rick caught his expression of surprise and bragged about his observational skills.

“I made it the same way you drank it at the diner.”

Rick had always been observant for the smallest details, but Morty was impressed that he had even paid attention to a stranger's preference for coffee.

“Morning,” he compromised, dropping the _good_ and _baby_ , before retorting in confused disbelief, mood forgotten for a brief moment.

“… How the _fuck_ are you shirtless right now?”

Rick shrugged. “Cause like half the bay, I didn't bother putting on a shirt before coming out.”

Morty snorted into his mug, and Rick looked pleased with himself to see Morty's reaction. They made eye contact for a brief moment and Morty quickly looked away from the iridescent plasma of electric blue eyes that were still so perfectly his in so many small unspoken ways. He couldn’t look at them right now.

The ways in which he was similar hurt to remember.

The ways in which he was different hurt to acknowledge.

Regardless, existence was painful, and he would live with his choices. Morty sniffed and smiled at this Rick, grateful for his warm and strangely-familiar presence in the cold morning. He internally congratulated himself on dodging the emotional bullet of sleeping with him the previous night, and was fairly certain this Rick was thinking the same thing.

At the thought, however, he stole another glance at the nude torso of the younger Rick, who was wearing a pair of low-slung pants that might as well have been a flashing neon blue sign that the carpet matched the drapes. He decided he was staring too long when he started to wonder if Rick had also brought him some eggs, because even in the cold morning air that could harden nipples, 24-year-old Rick-fucking-Sanchez was _still_ hot enough to fry and eat an egg off.

Morty looked away at the thought of his tongue doing just that; suddenly grateful for the cold air, he took another sip of his coffee, feeling the warmth of the liquid spread through him alongside a fierce blush. _What the fuck was with his emotions this morning?_ Rick snickered at Morty's obviousness but said nothing and gave him a pass. Morty, meanwhile, suspected that the _shirtless coffee_ move was a tried and true tactic of Rick Sanchez, and grew irritated by the thought of Rick knowing exactly how well it had just worked on him.  

Rick scooted into the bed, making a grab for one of the blankets, and Morty bundled himself more tightly and pulled away from his grasp, unwilling to share.

“Hey, I brought you coffee in bed, gimme one of those.”

“Fuck you, it's cold.”

“– Fuck _you_ , you little shit, you'd’ve been in a park right now freezing your balls off if it weren't for Stella.”

“Yeah, but you're the one who fuckin’ walked out here without a shirt to try’n impress me.”

Rick stopped grabbing for a blanket momentarily, unable to resist the lead-in Morty had offered. Still holding his coffee, he laid himself on the mattress like a pinup and exaggeratedly ran fingers down the middle of his chest and onto the tuft of blue fuzz.  

“– Oh, did it work? Flashing the treasure trail usually does the trick.”

If Rick hadn’t threatened him over making a mess in his “baby”, Morty would have thrown a pillow at that shit-eating grin and spilled hot coffee everywhere so that his carpet could match the heat of his fucking ego.

“It didn't.” Morty hid his face behind the mug before offering the edge of his blanket. “The coffee worked better.”  

Instead of taking the blanket, Rick lifted the edge and sidled up next to him, wrapping the covers around the both of them to share.

“It’s warmer if we share – See, was that so fuckin’ hard?”

“With you?” Morty teased Rick, settling into a familiar banter.

“Anyone tell you, you have a bit of a shitty personality?”

“You wouldn't be the first.” Morty let out a sigh. He had been the first.

Rick chuckled beside him as he scooted closer, tugging the blanket more tightly around them, and Morty found himself leaning into the warmth. After the emotional drain of the morning, the closeness felt reassuring in a way he wasn't aware he'd needed until Rick had offered the unsolicited, unspoken comfort to him.

Rick picked up on the smallest details. After they had settled Rick turned the radio down to speak with him in a serious tone.   

“Okay, Morty, while you’re figuring your shit out, we need to get you streetwise.”

“– I have common sense. I wear a shirt on cold mornings.” Morty laughed and Rick ignored his obvious dig.

“I’m serious, once I set you loose in the world you’re gonna have to fend for yourself – and I like you too much as you are right now to see these streets fuckin’ ruin you.”

Morty rolled his eyes, understanding the implication beneath Rick’s weighted setup. He was planning to continue his efforts to get Morty to return back home. The brunette’s voice grew irritated toward the man who refused to take him on his word the night before.  

“Ugh, why are you so fuckin’ convinced I'm gonna go back home.”

Rick paused for a moment then smiled in surprise at Morty's ability to so quickly read his intentions and cut to the chase. He rewarded Morty with an honest answer that also called him out.

“Because it's obvious by the way you woke up crying that there's at least one person back at the place you ran from that matters – no offense, Morty, but kids who run away from shitty places don't wake up crying about it like that.”

Mortys irritation grew at hearing Rick seem so sure of himself. He considered what his reaction would be if Morty really had just been a runaway. If that were the case, then Rick's suspicion would have been correct for the most part. He sighed in resignation, and carefully attempted to explain himself, upset at the understanding that Rick wasn’t likely to drop this without a good enough reason to.   

“Yeah, shows what you fuckin’ know, Rick.” Morty caught himself at the word, not ready to call this Rick by his own name. “Cause, _that person_ _was_ the last thing keeping me from... – Look, It doesn't matter. There isn't anyone to go back to anymore.”

Morty took a deep breath to stabilize himself, and clenched his eyes shut trying to think of a way to safely give this Rick a good enough reason to drop it without testing the volatile emotions he woke with, or risking some time-paradox shit.  

“He _told_ me to leave, and after… after, I-I think he –”

Morty abruptly stopped talking as his voice began to crack. He couldn't hear himself confirm with his own voice what he so deeply felt he already knew. Not after the memories of him fresh in his mind this morning. Not while staring at him as a complete stranger. He dropped the line of thought but remained firm. He didn’t want to have this conversation with Rick again, and his next words were low.

“I don't have a home to go back to.”

Morty continued to avoid Rick’s cutting gaze as they sat in a weighted silence before he felt an arm move under the blanket to wrap around his shoulders and pull him into a side hug. Rick said nothing and only pulled the boy tighter into the warmth of his body, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and running a hand along the side of his arm in a comforting gesture. His other hand lifted the mug of coffee to his lips. Morty followed the movement, taking another sip of his own coffee while the man next to him collected his thoughts and sighed out a curse.  

“Fuck. Welcome to the club, kid.”

 

***

 

“You usually uh, I dunno Rick, you usually wanna drink alone, so… what makes tonight so different?” 

“Tonight, we’re celebrating our return to civilization by drinking plutonian tequila!” 

Rick lifted the brand new bottle of alien liquor in display to Morty.  

“No more of that fermented jungle juice shit I was making for months in the teenyverse just to keep myself from going into alcohol withdrawal – and I dunno, Morty, sometimes I'm just tired and wanna share a drink with my grandson. After this last adventure, I realized that I used up all of my strength in my youth. A hard life doesn't make you any stronger, kid, it just drains you. Tonight I'm feeling a little extra drained, and your old man could use a helping hand – have a shot with me.” 

Morty lifted himself on the stool next to his grandfather as he popped the seal.  

“Besides, Summer fuckin' – ruined the ice cream, and that months-long adventure was only supposed to be a fun night out watching Ball Fondlers... I think you earned a drink with your grandpa.”  

 _“I'm pretty proud of this bad boy… I put a spatially tessellated void inside a modified temporal field until a planet developed intelligent life.”_  

Rick took a swig of the liquor before leaning over the hood of his spaceship and beginning to disconnect the wires of the microverse battery. They had just returned from an adventure where he had played an alien deity from beyond the stars and conned an entire planet into producing energy for his galactic vehicle.  

 _“You're my battery, motherfucker. That's all you are! And when I get out of this teenyverse, I'm gonna smash it to pieces with you in it!”_  

Although his grandfather had a god complex he’d never been good at playing God, and after the adventure inevitably went south, and they had been stranded with neanderthals for months, Morty was surprised that they’d made it back home at all. He suspected Rick was feeling the same way, because he’d been drinking heavily since their return, inviting Morty to join him.  

When Rick drank alone, which was the most common way for him to drink, it was because he wanted to be alone with his thoughts. He would loudly cite his cover of _working late in the garage tonight,_ which everyone in the Smith household understood to mean that he was planning to get blackout drunk and didn’t want to be disturbed.  

After an incident of almost getting shot by Rick weilding a drunken blaster for ignoring the request, Morty had cautiously followed the routine of making sure to only enter the garage after he was sure his grandfather had _actually_ blacked out. Waking up to find that Rick had drowned in his own vomit was the one adventure Morty never wanted to experience, and the teen was willing to risk getting shot to prevent it from ever happening. He’d turn his grandfather to the side before setting out, alongside a glass of water, a bucket, a bottle of aspirin, and his full flask to be easily found the next morning. This was the preferred routine. He was familiar with taking care of grandfather in this state. 

When he drank in Morty’s presence, however, Rick _didn’t_ want to be alone with his thoughts, and that motivation created an entirely different, more unpredictable drunk to deal with. The abnormally good mood it put his grandfather in was perfectly unsettling. Morty sometimes wished he could enjoy spending time with Rick like this, but he never liked to see, nor acknowledge, that alcohol could allow his grandfather to feel so happy. It was easier to blame the drug for causing his depression than admit it was his grandfather’s own thoughts that were to blame, and tonight, as they worked on the microverse battery, Morty understood his preference for being with his grandfather as a belligerent depressed drunk that was real to him over being reminded of the unpleasant reality that the seemingly happiest he’d ever seen his grandfather was while he was abusing substances – When he wasn’t acting anything like himself.  

Their interactions tonight felt like a mixture of real and artificial as his grandfather, without inhibition, jovially talked to him about a variety of topics.  

Earlier in the microverse pocket dimension, Rick had gotten into a fight with the “Rick” of the alien planet named Zeep Xanflorp. Their shared encounter had driven both of the scientists into an unhealthy competitive obsession that concluded with a primitive human display of his grandfather removing every article of clothing above his waist before proceeding to beat the shit out of the alien in a final showdown. Rick ended the fight by smashing a rock into the alien’s skull and spitting on the lifeform.

They could have just climbed into the battery’s ship and run away, but there was something indescribably important to Rick about chasing some sort of closure with Zeep, and Morty hadn’t understood any of it. When he'd questioned his grandfather on the seemingly unnecessary violence, the older man had brushed the teen’s question off and dug for his flask out of the pile of clothes Morty was holding. 

His knuckles were torn up, and dried blood caked his face in gobs and crusty flakes. He turned to Morty, raising his flask in a toast, with a bruising eye, and reiterated what he told Zeep seconds before walking down the ramp to throw his first punch to the sound of cracking thunder.  

“ _You quit school, Morty, but you still got some learning to do_.” 

Morty stared at his grandfather’s nude torso as they left the Microverse. It was far from a piece of extra curvy driftwood, and the sinewy muscles surged and rippled with adrenaline from the fight. Bruises were already beginning to form across his abdomen, and his chest rose and fell from the exertion. Morty lowered the pile of clothes he had been holding onto his lap to hide his erection, turned on by the presentation, and found himself staring far too long at the tuft of blue hair that rose above the hem of his grandfather’s pants. Rick caught him staring, and reached his hand out in silence, gesturing for his clothes with the intent to get dressed. Morty awkwardly pulled the hem of his own shirt downwards, only making arousal more obvious, but Rick gave him a pass, rolling his eyes before facing away from him to pull a shirt over his head. 

They returned to civilization and finished their original adventure for ice cream, and Morty was so grateful to return that he hadn’t even noticed the flies in his dessert. Rick, however, seemed unusually anxious and was snappy at Summer about the telepathic spider treaty ruining his favorite ice cream. Summer blamed Rick’s ship and an argument escalated. Rick accused Summer for looking at a bum wrong before throwing the ice cream on the floor, announcing that they were going home.  

Morty was certain that the fight with Zeep had Rick shaken, but he wasn’t sure why. 

“Ye~ah! Here’s to fighting to live another day, Morty!”  

Morty choked back a full gulp of tequila from the bottle, but he didn’t care to have more. He knew how much of a lightweight he was, and he never liked the headspace hard liquor took him to when he passed his limit. As they listened to the radio and Morty watched Rick’s muscles work, he sighed contentedly, remembering the scene of his shirtless grandfather and the blue fuzz that perfectly matched his crown of hair. He paused his imaginations, caught in curiosity. 

“Hey Rick...Your hair is naturally blue.”  

“Yeah, and so is the sky. Mo-OUGRH-ty. It’s always been blue.”  

“I thought your hair was blue because you’re so old.” 

“Heh, Morty, you think I got called “Blue” back in the day because of my ‘electric blue’ eyes? Pfft...” Rick waved a drunken, dismissive hand at him.  

“Even though I just beat the shit outta Zeep, you only see me as old – I’ve always had flaming blue hair, Morty, and I _fuckin’_ _hated_ it until I learned about how fuckin’ rare natural – How rare blue is... in nature – and not just Earth, but universally – made me feel like the universe was telling me that I was special. That I mattered or something.” 

Rick cursed, shocking himself on the livewire of the microverse battery. He quickly pulled his hand away with a hiss and sucked on it to numb the pain as Morty sighed in resignation, continuing to watch.  

He never liked when Rick worked on projects when he was impaired beyond his usual level of high-functioning alcoholic. Alcohol gave his grandfather permission to feel, and when the emotion wasn’t happiness, and he worked on projects in a drunken state of mind, he had a tendency to overthink shit, then piece together downright terrifying inventions which soberingly reflected his overall outlook on the human condition.  

Morty didn't know what to think about Rick having allowed his grandson to see such products of his mind, but the teen had diffused too many sloppily assembled neutrino bombs in the bunker, sorely hoping that Rick's emotional drunken ideas would never leave the questionably healthy outlet of the garage.   

Rick continued his line of thought about the color blue with a sense of pride in his voice. He flexed his arm in a show of strength. 

“Nature doesn’t fuck around when it creates a creature in blue. Outside of the ocean, the bluest living things make the color with microscopic structures, and each one’s a little different. No vertebrate, not a single bird or mammal or reptile on Earth makes a naturally blue pigment on its body – not even in human eyes! The color is all just a trick of the eye. Nature’s sleight of hand using light.”  

Morty was pulled from his thoughts as he listened to Ricks inebriated conversation, trying to follow.  

“Uh, Rick, aren’t all colors just a reflection of light? Like, uh, because a surface absorbs all the colors except for what we see... How is blue any different?”

Rick scrubbed his fingers through his hair and knocked back another shot of tequila with a determined intent to get wasted as quickly as possible. He slammed the bottle on the work desk and shook it out with a sound halfway between a growl and a hiss, before offering the bottle to Morty, who pretended to take a small sip, already feeling the effects of the first shot. 

“With blue, the color isn’t just a reflection – It’s a manipulation of light... those microscopic surface structures are designed to trap light waves… reflecting back into itself until the waves diffract and prevent any color from being properly reflected – but blue is the sweet spot on the visible spectrum, and it’s the only color that can survive – the only color that emerges from the diffracted chaos.”

“So...those really blue butterflies–” 

“–Blue Morpho.” 

“Yeah, even with them, it's uh, just a bunch of colors being reflected at the same time – and so all we end up seeing is blue?”  

Rick nodded a swollen eye in approval of Morty’s understanding and animatedly continued. 

“Yep, exactly like that, _Major Tom_ – It’s why planet Earth is blue, and there's nothing you can do… The oceans, the sky, the starry nights – It’s a color born out of diffraction – the complexity of the fuckin’ universe.”  

Morty’s thoughts continued to focus on butterflies as his grandfather drunkenly rambled more examples. A variety of patterns were found on butterfly wings in nature; specific colors and patterns existed for defense or survival, but the blue morpho butterfly had neither, only a mesmerizing iridescent shimmer that moved as if the color itself were alive. Sometimes, his grandfather’s eyes would shimmer in the same ethereal way.  

“Hey, Rick... if patterns and colors in nature are like a, uh, are like some kind of secret message of the universe – Why do you think your hair...your eyes, are blue?”  

With slightly lowered inhibitions, Morty reached out to touch the blue strands of his grandfather’s hair. Rick’s reaction was instantaneous, and he immediately pulled away from his grandson with a snarl. His jovial drunken demeanor quickly changed into a more familiar presence as he frowned, lifting the tequila bottle with a glare and swallowing a few long chugs before slamming the glass on the table and wiping the drool from his face. The tone of his words was charged with drunken bitterness. 

“I’m like an oceanic cyanophore, Morty, a mixture of both structures and pigments... Since the biggest concentration of blue is growing _out of my fuckin’ head_ , I think the obvious message is about what’s _in_ my head – what’s _Behind Blue Eyes_ – and I hate to break it to ya, Morty, but it doesn't matter what _I_ think it means because the message isn’t for me – Never has been. The universe wasn’t trying to tell me shit.”   

  

Rick mumbled something about peace among worlds before pushing a button on the side of the disconnected microverse battery. The swirling star system flashed into a blue quasar as the central star collapsed, burning away the surrounding planets before folding into itself, becoming a black hole and draining away what remained of the entire world Morty had spent the last few months living in.

Morty’s jaw fell open as he was left in the quiet of the garage, staring at the empty glass box which had only moments ago held a universe of interconnected lives.

_I never asked to be born._

Morty had promised Zeep that Rick wouldn't destroy his universe once they got home, but Zeep knew better, like he had known his own ethical bullshit about creating a society with extra steps – Like he knew his own bullshit about sharing a drink with Rick after they had worked together to get out of the teenyverse alive.

Rick had known it too, and that was the reason he walked back down the ramp to fight. He didn’t believe in the easy way out. He believed that the right to survive was something that was continuously fought for and won.

He believed it was survival of the fittest.   

“Like the blue ringed octopus sending out the clearest fuckin’ warning in the universe, Morty, the message is pretty fuckin’ simple.”

Morty held himself against the spaceship with a shaky hand for a few moments, before folding over and vomiting bile, ice cream, and liquor on the cement floor of the garage. Rick watched silently with an expression of regret, then looked towards the tequila bottle in his hand, before chugging what remained.

“I'm poison.”

Rick carelessly tossed the bottle behind him as the poison coursed through his veins, not bothering to watch the glass break into pieces, before returning to his familiar routine. He walked over to his workbench to sit and informed his grandson that he was _busy working on shit_ , and that Morty needed to leave so that he could get blackout drunk alone.

He no longer wanted to share his thoughts with Morty.  

 

***

 

“Okay, kid, I gave you my real name last night. But it's Blue in there – Don’t give anyone _your_ real name either.”

“What are you even talking about?”

Rick walked Morty to the door of the yellow Victorian house, and rested his hand on the doorknob, before pushing it open, to give him a warning.

“No one in this flop house knows my real name and I wanna keep it that way. – Call me Rick anytime out of Stella’s presence and you can find your own place to figure your shit out, _comprende?_ We’re just here to make a quick courtesy appearance, twenty minutes, in and out, then we’ll be on our way.”

Morty enjoyed the idea that Rick had exclusively given him his real name, and didn’t mind calling him “Blue” for the time being. He had gone on adventures using code names before, so it wouldn’t be very hard to switch, and Morty was secretly relieved, because Rick’s real name was too emotionally loaded to use this morning.

He had understood, in theory, that he was going to meet a younger version of his own grandfather, and that, at the same time, this Rick would ultimately be a slight iteration _away_ from him _because_ of Morty’s involvement in his timeline. But, in practice, it was an entirely different experience, and Morty was still gathering his emotions about it.

It had been easy to think of it in scientific terms, using dimensional timeline splits to measure how different and alike the spaces between them were. But, emotionally, the spaces were interwoven – shimmering with similarities and differences as they danced within each passing moment, and Morty, feeling slightly overwhelmed, couldn’t help but feel that he had been unprepared for the experience of putting theory into practice.

Morty stepped into the house as Rick followed closely behind him and shut the door. A group of faces glanced up see who had entered, before returning to their individual interests. Rick caught the hem of Morty’s jacket to keep him from going further.

The house looked like it was in fair condition, but it was an empty shell, completely void of furniture. The windows had been covered with sheets of newspaper and cardboard, leaving the room a dark yellowish color. About a half-dozen people were strewn about the layout, lining the walls, curled into their own bodies or resting beneath piles of cardboard or blankets. Morty noticed a few limbs sticking out from the scraps.  

A red-haired woman about Rick’s age rose from the floor and walked over to them, carrying her blankets around her shoulders. She gave a quick glance to Rick before pressing hands into Morty’s cheeks in a gentle tease.

“Aww, so you’re the stray who blue-balled Blue? You're cute. I could see why he wanted to take you in. I would’ve wanted to play around with you, too.”

The redhead chuckled as Morty blushed and pulled away, looking at Rick with a panicked expression and causing him to laugh. Rick turned to the redhead with a sincere expression.

“Leave ‘im alone MJ, he woke up hard-timing this morning.”

“Darn, poor thing... It’ll be alright. You’ll be okay.” The redhead, who was just taller than Morty, pulled him into a warm hug, and when Morty returned the embrace he caught a frown out of the corner of Rick’s eye.

“C’mon, you’re gonna get the kid attached.” Morty rolled his eyes at Rick’s statement – as if this kind of comforting hug wasn’t exactly what Rick had just given him ten minutes ago in the privacy of Stella. MJ’s hug was different than Rick’s however, and the manner that she spoke into her tender embrace grounded and supported him in a way that made him think of his older sister.

No one had ever stopped Morty from risking his life on adventures with his grandfather, and he passively wondered how Summer would take the news of his disappearance. He had assumed, that she, like the rest of the Smith family, thought the possibility of his dying or going MIA had long been a question of not _if_ , but _when_.

Summer was in her final semester of college. After she had left the house she never talked to their parents, and only talked to Morty whenever he called. As time went on she preferred to text her younger brother, and then there were only short formal messages on his birthday and holidays. Morty never asked for more from her. He could imagine how hard it was to, at Morty’s beckoning, continually be pulled back into the household she’d escaped from. She wanted nothing more than to cut the Smith family out of her life like the toxic malignant tumor it was, and eventually Morty stopped calling, then texting, because even though she would never say it, he understood that he was the final tendon keeping her from doing just that.

He pressed himself into the stranger’s hug at the emotion it pulled out of him, regretting that he hadn't thought to tell his sister goodbye, and wondered if it had even mattered.

Rick let out an irritated sigh as if his point had just been made.     

“–So, is he just a stray or is it for sure...” a bald man sitting next to the wall interrupted the conversation with the intent to get information. Rick glanced at Morty for a moment, who pulled away from MJ and glared back, waiting to hear the answer which he had all but confirmed with him. Rick calculatingly stared at Morty for a moment before turning to the man with an intentionally dismissive shrug.

“Not sure. Gonna give him the _Day in The Life_ tour in Stella and we’ll find out.”

Morty growled out an irritated sigh as MJ moved closer to Rick, giving his shirtless body a more intimate hug and teasing into his ear while a few half-assed jeers and catcalls swelled into the the room. Morty watched as Rick’s hands slid under the covers and down her lower back, before wrapping fingers around her hips and gently pushing her away.  

“You just can't resist picking up strays, can you, Blue.”

If MJ had known that Rick had been blue-balled by Morty, it wasn’t hard to figure out where Rick had ended up sleeping in the house last night, and the young adult, who had also been blue-balled by his own better judgement, found himself slightly jealous of the way they were currently eye fucking each other.

Morty took the first opportunity to distract them. “Wait, _Blue,_ ” he paused to place emphasis on the fake name, “I thought you said you didn't pick up strays.”

The room filled with a quiet chorus of laughter. MJ joined in while continuing to look at Rick with a hand in front of her face before turning to Morty. Rick looked slightly embarrassed and crossed his arms in front of himself, glaring at Morty, who continued to play dumb.  

“No, baby… Blue has a cute habit of returning the strays he thinks have run away from good homes.”

Another woman who had been laughing, slightly younger than Morty, glanced up from her blankets and made a mimicry of Rick’s voice. “Has he given you the _this world will chew you up and spit you out_ speech yet?”

Another chorus of laughter. Morty suppressed a laugh, enjoying the sight of Rick, shirtlessly sulking with a satisfyingly doused ego. Rick had never enjoyed discussions about himself while he was present in the room, and the younger version of him flipped them all off and motioned to go up the stairs. Morty began to follow but Rick turned and poked a finger into his chest to keep him in place.

“You’re not allowed upstairs, kid.”  

“What’s upstairs?” Morty asked. He knew it wasn't his business to know or ask questions, but his curiosity had gotten the better of him when he was denied access.

“A bunch of people who don’t wanna come down.”

Morty rolled his eyes at the dismissive answer, and Rick patted Morty on the back as if to silently wish him luck before heading up the stairs. Morty watched him climb over a person sleeping on the steps before turning back to the group of people in the front room. He leaned against the stairwell, not knowing if Rick wanted Morty to have a conversation without him present. Morty was his own person, but he didn’t know this room of strangers, and was trying his best to follow Rick’s advice.

The room was quiet for a few minutes before the bald man spoke to him. He looked a bit gaunt – his eyes were sunken into discolored skin, and his brown goatee seemed out of place. It looked as if he had been itching at his arms, because they were littered with small scabs. Morty was wary from watching the way Rick had interacted with him earlier.

“What's your name, _kid_?” he asked, and Morty didn’t like the feeling of being intentionally called by the same term of endearment that Rick had used. MJ was about to speak before Morty talked first, glombing onto Rick with his answer.

“Blue told me not to say.”

Rick poked his head into view from upstairs, before shouting at him to the groans of a number of people in the house trying to sleep.

“Fuckin’ kid, you're not supposed to tell them I said _that_!”

“– Oh jeez! Fuck, I’m sorry.” Morty jumped at Rick’s voice and nervously bowed his head, rubbing his hand behind his neck, embarrassed as he realized that Rick was probably right. Morty had been more concerned about not sharing his real name, and tying himself to Rick’s power in this group – whatever that power was.

More laughter filled the room at Morty’s panicked, nervous reaction. It seemed that he was their main source of entertainment for the morning. He blushed, silently thankful that Rick had left him to sleep in the van instead of inviting him into the house last night.

MJ smiled at Morty before speaking loud enough for Rick to hear. “How about we call him Perrito? Cause he's another one of your lost strays?” The room collectively continued to snicker at MJ’s teasing, and the tone of Rick’s voice changed as he returned down the stairs, pulling on a shirt and slipping on his bomber jacket.

“Fuck off! He was gonna get picked up like Beaver.”

At that, the entire room fell silent with a mutual understanding.

Rick made his way to a pair of milk crates on the far side of the room, carefully stepping over another sleeping body in his path. He patted the surface next to him, and without hesitation Morty walked over to sit by his side. The room was silent for a moment before exploding with laughter. Morty glanced around, confused that he'd missed something, and looked to Rick for guidance. The older man had also joined in the ensued laughter and reached out to endearingly ruffle his hair.

“Perrito.” He smiled as his laughter calmed, “I like it.”

He gestured to the half dozen people in the surrounding room, and Morty wondered how many more were in the upper level.  

“Meet the No-Home club, Perrito – A bunch of wandering vagabonds who’ve formed a collective. – And before you ask, no. It’s not a gang, cause there's no initiation and you’re free to come and go.”

“But… You’re in a house?”

MJ sat on the ground next to Rick and Morty on a piece of cardboard, tucking her legs under the blanket.

“We’re currently squatting in a nice house and periodically turn on the water, but eventually the man will show up, and we'll book it back onto the streets until we get word of another. It’s strength in numbers. The more people in one space, the less of us they can arrest when they find us, and in the meantime, we look out for and take care of each other.”

“Isn’t that what shelters are for though?” Morty genuinely asked, fairly certain that shelters had existed in the 70’s. Rick condescendingly snorted.

“Shelter's are drama and drug fueled cesspools, kid. _Especially_ if you’re young and naive.” Rick gave a side glare to Morty, as if he were warning him from the idea entirely. “It’s better to pick the streets. Their resources are overstretched, and it’s unpredictable. A lot of people are supporting addictions and won't think twice about the moral dilemma of taking what little you have if it means you can support their habit – and a lot of junkies go there with the intention of taking advantage of naive kids like you.”

The rest of the group nodded and murmured in agreement. MJ concluded Rick’s scathing review with a more practical summary. “It’s better to live on the streets with people you know, than in a house of strangers you don’t.”

“Yeah, Perrito, it’s almost like having a real family.” Rick added, his voice dripping with obvious sarcasm. “Not that any of us here know what the fuck that’s like.”

Morty ignored Rick’s bitter statement and nodded towards MJ. He’d always disliked the idea of family, primarily, because it had made having sexual and romantic feelings for his grandfather taboo, but, also, because the definitions of family never quite matched the dysfunctional residence of the Smith family household. The idea of a family forged by shared values instead of blood had always made more sense to him.

“I like that you get to choose your own family out here.”

Rick too quickly scoffed at him. “Yeah well don't, because _family values_ are a purely practical relationship when cherries and berries start flashing outside.”

“Ehh, you're paranoid Blue…” A new voice joined the conversation. A large muscled man who looked about the same age as Rick slid a panel of cardboard away to reveal himself to the group. He groggily looked around the room, before catching sight of Morty and nodding to him.

“Don't listen to him kid, he's more paranoid than some of the returned vets. It's why he has that whole satellite membership with the van.”

“– Yeah, real nice coming from you, Namn. I take added precautions because I never got a _served my country_ get out of jail free card.”

“You skirted the fuckin’ draft!”

“I told you – I already _served_ time to my country.”

“– You _told_ me you love it when I ride your ass like you’re my prison bitch...”

Rick tossed him a shit-eating grin and bit his lip before kissing at him. “That's cause you’re a brick house, baby.”

Morty had thought they were arguing, but was no longer entirely sure. Instead of being jealous towards this person as well, Morty rephrased his internal question of who Rick _had_ slept with in the house to who he _hadn’t fucked_. MJ caught Morty’s expression and put a hand on his arm, and with a lighthearted laugh, spoke in a hushed tone. “They always argue, but it’s never serious. Namn recently got back from the war, and Blue’s the only one of us who’s done time in a state prison... so they get along where it counts.”

Rick jumped into MJ’s gossip with Morty, intentionally interrupting them. “And compared to the streets, jail’s not as bad as you think, kid. Once you detox you have a guaranteed bed, a routine, and a meal.”

Rick turned back to Namn and defensively continued. “My fuckin’ paranoia comes from the streets and it’s well earned. There's a reason I've been around longer than most of you, and it's not because of my good looks or how well I fuckin’ ride cock-city.”

“Not longer than me.” The redhead stuck out a tongue towards Rick and he reciprocated, flashing his piercing.

Namn rolled his eyes and covered himself with the cardboard again. “You come and go, Blue, that’s your thing. But when you show up we like to see you, and not just ‘cause you're a good shag, or bring in enough money for everyone to eat.”

“Brings in money?” Morty questioned.

“– Strength in numbers” Rick reiterated MJ’s earlier sentiment. “The collective pools their resources and it’s _share and share alike_. MJ manages the house pot.”

“I uh.. Don’t wanna say something rude, but that seems, I dunno, dangerous… maybe?”  

Rick glanced to MJ with an arched eyebrow as he tilted his head towards Morty as if “Perrito” had made a point on his behalf. Morty’s admiration of MJ grew as he learned more about her –  who she was and how she fit into the small homeless community. She had brought everyone together and was managing their shared financial and physical resources, despite the target it made her.

“Even with the risk... it’s a better way to live. People need each other most.”   

She seemed to know that the collective was only as strong as the people who wanted to support her, and Morty was inspired by that kind of strength. Rick, even though he didn’t fully participate, must have wanted to support her as well.

Morty glanced at Rick, wondering why he hadn’t fully bought into the collective. By the way the group interacted with him, he must have been at least partially involved for a while. MJ read his movements and offered an answer.

“Blue contributes generously to use the water when we have it. Understandably, he prefers to keep to Stella – but he always has a home here, or wherever we are.”

“A no-home.” Morty echoed the philosophy behind the name.

Rick stared at MJ for a long moment before sticking his hands in his pockets and looking away from her. Morty followed the interaction and asked another question, wanting to know more.

“How long have you been at _this_ house?”

Rick sternly spoke over MJ’s answer.

“Too long. I told you guys they're watching it... You need to leave soon. I-I shouldn’t even be parking Stella out front.”

“So why did you yesterday?”  

Rick looked at the redhead for another moment before leaning into the wall and turning his head away in dismissal.  

“I had shit to take care of.”

Morty looked at Rick’s white lie with a frown. Rick had left Stella parked out front because he wasn't planning on coming back. This group of people would have been gifted with everything he owned, so they had to be more important to Rick than he was willing to let on. Rick caught Morty staring at him in knowing silence and put the topic of conversation back on the young adult.

“Anyway, kid, if you're gonna be a road-kid, then we gotta figure out your hustle.”

A series of groans from a few people in the room. It seemed that while this was novel to Morty, it was far from for the regular residents of the collective. Morty smiled to himself, wondering how many kids Rick had sent home using this exact process, and it was Morty's turn to roll his eyes. Rick’s voice had the tone of an adventure written all over it.

“The most important thing for you, right now, is knowing what you can you do for money.”

This was a question Rick had taught Morty a number of answers for. He had normalized the concepts of pickpocketing, conning, and scamming. Morty wondered if Rick had first acquired these skills on the streets.

“You mean like pickpocketing?”

“Nope, try again – don’t go straight for the illegal shit, kid.”

“I uh...I'm not really sure...what I can do.”

“Perrito, you should just spange. You're cute enough.” The bald man who had been silent for the majority of the conversation offered the suggestion with a dark chuckle. Rick kept his eyes trained on Morty, purposely ignoring him.  

“No begging,” Rick interjected before adding, “unless you wanna tell everyone who’s looking that you’re stranded on the street without resources – Fastest way to get picked up, especially if you’re a kid.”

“I’m not a kid, I’m eighteen.”

“Doesn’t matter – you look a lot younger.”

The younger woman from earlier who’d made fun of Rick threw out a better idea. “I could show him how to pass as a student. I mean, if he needs to crash or sleep he'd blend right in on campus if he kept his looks up.”

“Not a bad idea, Kitty.” Rick nodded before pointedly suggesting, “and neither is an honest job.”

Morty panicked as he considered the identification papers he would need to be able to get a job. He hadn’t even fucking considered that he technically wouldn’t exist in the system. Rick had never cared to acknowledge any sort of system and Morty had just picked up his habit, pretending like it never existed.

“I don’t think I can. I’m...I don’t exist on record, I’m off grid I gue–”

Rick quickly grabbed Morty’s shoulders and looked at him with a cutting and serious gaze.

“Don’t _ever_ say those words aloud again.”

Morty tried to look away from Rick, who shook his shoulders and growled out a, _”Hey, look at me,”_ to get him to make eye contact. His fingers were tense, and they dug into Morty’s shoulders with a sense of urgency. Morty lifted his gaze to meet the mercilessly shimmering blue of Rick’s emotions. He growled at him with anger and Morty’s heart ached.

“You just told everyone in this room that you could disappear without a trace. Do you understand that – the information you just fuckin’ _volunteered_ ?” Morty nodded as he fought the swelling emotions and tried to look away from him. Rick sensed Morty’s panic before quickly releasing the young adult, who turned his entire body away from Rick as if he had been burnt, and nodded in an answer of understanding. MJ shot a glare at Rick, muttering something sarcastic about _no longer being able to drop the kid off at the station_ , before reaching a hand out to Morty and taking a softer approach than he had.    

“You’re an illegal – so you probably know about how tough it is to get work, but on the streets it means you need to be extra careful about getting picked up by the fuzz.”

“He needs to be careful about getting disappeared by a fuckin’ trafficker,” Rick corrected as the conversation was interrupted by the bald man, who let out a melodramatic lamenting sigh. 

“The cute ones never wanna hook, _such a shame_ – Perrito could make a lot of money for us, _especially_ if he doesn't need to exist.”

Rick swiftly rose and bared his teeth toward the man who had offered the purposefully antagonistic suggestion. His quiet, dead expression was one that Morty had known as his no-bullshit intention to throw more than a punch. The shimmering edges of his cutthroat gaze were laced with poison, and his eyes were cold with murderous intent. Morty shared a panicked glance with MJ before both stood and attempted to cut into the tension.  

“Uh, w-what about playing music, like, guitar?”

Morty reached out to grab Rick’s sleeve and the man angrily shook off the young adult’s grip, not moving his eyes from the direction of the person he was staring down, his entire body tense. The collective held their breath for a few moments in silence before Rick broke his gaze away and looked back to Morty to continue their conversation.

“You any good at it?”

“M-my grandfather taught me.” Morty offered nervously without thinking, glad to have Rick’s attention away from a potential showdown. After he spoke, he felt his chest swell with pride in being able to say those words. He was good at it _because_ his grandfather taught him. Rick responded, anger completely dissipated, as if the confrontation from a few seconds ago had never even happened. He smiled and ruffled Morty’s hair for a bit longer than necessary, and Morty wondered if it was an intentional, territorial gesture.  

“Why didn’t you say so earlier, kid? Busking is one of the safest ways to make money in the bay. If you wanna try and busk, we gotta get you set up in a good spot before the others get there.”   

Rick pushed Morty off balance and started walking towards the door to leave, Morty assumed, before getting into a fight. He and MJ followed him out the front door, as they made their way towards Stella.

“He looks well off enough that people will give him money too.”

“Wait, what does that mean?” Morty was confused, and so far MJ had given Morty more practical information on being homeless. Rick had only shared more of the same _Trust No One_ life philosophy that his older self clutched tightly to his chest. Morty wanted to know more of her perspective. MJ understood just as much as Rick, the realities and dangers of being homeless, but nonetheless she dared to open her arms to the people she surrounded herself with, if not unafraid of the risks, then at least being uncontrolled by them. For that, Morty liked her.  

“It means that people are more likely to help you when you look like you don't need help that badly.”

As they reached the van, MJ pulled Morty into a parting embrace and Rick opened the door and teasingly let out a dog whistle for Morty to hurry up.

“C’mon, Perrito, get in! Got some shit to do today!”

Morty and MJ laughed before the young adult hurried round to the passenger side. MJ dropped her blankets in favor of lifting her arms into the open window of Stella and looking at Rick, who returned a stern look.

“If that had been on the stree–”

MJ pressed a playful finger to his lips to quiet what she already knew he was going to say, and Rick smiled before playfully motioning to bite her finger.   

“Catch you later, Blue... Don’t forget, you have a home.”

Rick leaned forward and kissed the top of her head, before playfully pushing her out of the window. He rolled up the window to Stella and teasingly mouthed a series of silent words to her with a laugh. She struck a stubborn pose through the glass and folded her arms in a refusal to wave, before giving in and waving them away with a smile.

Rick dropped the visor to reveal the set of keys and started the engine.

“That’s not very _streetwise_.” Morty commented before remembering Rick had left the door of his van unlocked with the keys easily found for a reason. He cringed at himself as he heard Rick’s straightforward dismissive answer.

“Wasn’t meant to be – glad you didn’t steal any of my shit last night.” Rick steered the conversation back to Morty with a jab, knowing that he hadn’t even thought to check for the keys.

If it hadn’t been for the small reminders that Rick just as quickly dismissed, Morty might have completely forgotten that this person had tried to take his life the night before. If Morty had portaled into his world at any other moment, he likely would have never even glimpsed the chaos moving beneath his outgoing personality and calm demeanor on the surface. Morty chewed his lip, understanding that he had stepped into a moment Rick would have never allowed another soul to know of.

Rick had thought he was alone with his thoughts that night.       

Rick drove slowly, scanning the street as the van pulled forward and he talked to Morty. “Everyone thinks I’m paranoid as fuck, Morty, but this house is being watched. I wanna move Stella somewhere a bit safer, because everything I have is in this van, kid, and since we’re using gas anyways...might as well use it.”

“Oh, seatbelt – almost forgot.” Morty buckled his seatbelt as Stella continued to move down the narrow street. Rick dismissively shrugged at Morty’s gesture.

“Fuck that new seatbelt shit.”

 

***

 

“I ever tell you Beth let me choose your name?”

“Oh, so it's _you_ I have to blame – why the fuck did you pick a name like Mortimer?”

Rick had taken Morty out for ice cream at one of his favorite interdimensional franchises after they had successfully tele-transported a metric ton of purified fleeb juice out of the Galactic Federation and into the black market. Fencing it to a buyer had proved harder than stealing it, but Rick had held out for a few days in favor of a wholesale buyer because he didn't want to waste the time repackaging and selling it piecemeal. The wait had been worth it. Although Rick made less than he would have by selling it in smaller portions, he muttered something about opportunity cost and laziness making the cut in money worth it in the long run.

His grandfather congratulated Morty on having just made a shit ton of dirty money that couldn't be blown on anything but a series of small flurbos transactions, and so they'd spent the afternoon at Blipz and Chips, before ending the day with ice cream. Morty hadn't realized that the seamless heist had been pulled off for the exact purpose of having a fun day until his grandfather wished him a happy birthday.

Morty had forgotten. He didn't think it was anything special to celebrate.

“Yep.” Rick took ownership of being responsible for his grandson’s name. “After the Dead Sea, a sacred place where nothing can grow. It's like a fuckin pirate name, striking fear into the hearts of men with that salt the earth shit – I-If you ask me, it's wa~y fuckin’ cooler than Richard. A name like Mortimer, you could be like a... A walking intergalactic grim reaper, with the power to create and destroy entire fuckin’ worlds.”

“You're shit at naming things, Rick. Why would you name a baby after something that represents death?”

“You’re just being salty cause you can't appreciate my genius for what it is, _Mortimer_. Your name’s inspired by the one fundamental truth of the universe – transience. Everything changes. Nothing stays the same. The figurative death of one thing is the beginning of another. It's a transformation. A turning point.”

“So what “changed” when my life began?”

“A whole fucking lot. But it took me another 14 years to figure out exactly what.”

 

***

“So, _Morty_ , can you drive stick?”

Morty had been watching Rick’s hand rolling across the rounded knob of the gear shifter as they made their way through the San Francisco streets listening to the radio. Rick smirked at the young adult, intermittently glancing his way and pointedly using his real name in the private space of Stella. Morty glanced up to Rick as his cheeks burned, thinking that something so mundane shouldn’t sound like it was dripping with insinuated sex.

“No. But I’d…” He swallowed. “I think I’d like to learn.” Morty blushed deeper as he thought of the various ways that he wanted Rick to teach him. Rick picked up on Morty's awkward, unclear, creep-flirting and laughed at him.

“Hey kid – eyes up here.” Morty burned a shade darker and looked towards the dashboard, meeting Rick halfway with the request.

“We’re gonna get a good busking spot at Fisherman’s Wharf, but first we’re gonna make a pitstop for a quick bite. Once you stop eating it’s all downhill from there...go a few days without food: For the first few you're fucking starving, but then the hunger just disappears – you stop feeling anything, and if you haven't already, that’s when you start to consider using.”

“Like drugs?”

“No, kid, like fuckin’ McDonalds!”

Morty had asked for clarification because it was so surreal to hear Rick ramble with caution about the dangers of drug use. His grandfather had seemed to openly embrace the escapism of every substance under multiple suns.

Morty cradled the acoustic guitar case nestled between his legs as if he were holding a memory. Earlier, Rick had pulled it up to the front and told Morty to hold onto it while he drove, because it was one of his most valuable possessions outside of Stella.   

“Why’d you uh, start playing guitar?”

Rick glanced at Morty for a moment, before pulling out a cigarette and offering one to Morty.

“Give me a light, kid.”

“Sorry, I don’t have a lighter, _you_ fuckin’ stole it!” Morty feigned sympathy.

Rick gave a shit-eating grin to Morty as he shifted gears. “Steal it back then, foxy, it’s in my right pocket. Let’s see if you have any pickpocketing skills.”

Morty frowned at Rick’s flirtatious goading before stubbornly rising to his challenge. He leaned over and began pressing his hand against the denim of Rick’s pants pocket. Rick sputtered out laughter as Morty continued to search.

“I meant my jacket, Morty, but keep feeling me up like that, and you’re gonna find something bigger than a lighter. ”

Morty’s arm instantly retracted, and Rick continued to laugh, quickly taking his hands off the shifter and reaching into his jacket to pull out Morty’s white lighter and tossing it to him.

Morty scowled at Rick as the hot-headed youth kept his eyes on the road and leaned into the passenger’s side with a cigarette hanging from his mouth for Morty to light, muffled words mumbling through the clenched lips of a confident smirk.

“Gimme a light, kid.”

Morty had the urge to light his stubble on fire, but lit Rick’s cigarette instead, before lighting his own, rolling down the window, and making sure to return _his_ lighter to _his_ pocket. He exhaled a stream of heavy, sweet smelling smoke, still not entirely used to Rick’s clove cigarettes, though he hadn’t disliked them. His usual brand was Marlboros, and Morty was thankful he’d still be able to find them in the ‘70s.

Rick steered with his knee to give himself a free hand to roll down his own window and take a drag of his cigarette with the other, releasing the gear shifter. Morty watched the display, mouth agape, as the van moved down the street and he was presented with the absolute picture explaining why automatic functions in cars had been a safety breakthrough in vehicle design. He almost dropped the cigarette from his own fingers before quickly glancing at the speedometer and checking his seatbelt. Rick watched his motions and snickered, but returned a hand to the steering wheel in a reassuring gesture.  

“So… why guitar?” Morty reiterated, feeling like Rick had dodged the earlier question. Rick sighed, and pulled the cigarette from his mouth so he could speak.

“You want an honest answer or bullshit?”

“I want the answer that you wanna share with me.”    

“Well... if you’re not caught up in illegal shit, depression and boredom are your real enemies on the streets. Stella is the best thing that happened in my life – No sleeping in puddles of blood, urine, vomit, or shit in some squatter camp or a flop house.”

Rick affectionately patted the dashboard of the van.  

“But before Stella, when I was _really_ homeless, I thought of myself as a nobody – no feelings whatsoever... I just existed. I didn’t even see myself as fucking living because of all the drugs I was doing – all the _shit_ I was doing... then around sixteen I thought I was smart enough to start manufacturing and dealing drugs… I had the book smarts for it, but not the street smarts.”

“How long have you been on the streets?” Morty inquired. He had heard Rick mention being a road kid before, and it wasn’t surprising to know that he had been homeless at _some_ point in his life – _he was homeless when he showed up at the Smith household_ – but Morty had never known _how long_ he had been homeless in his younger years, and he was beginning to suspect that it had been for a while.

“In libraries and on the streets since I was twelve… but, really, independent since I was six. Learned to take care of myself early on. Like I said, for a lot of kids on the streets, running away’s their first instinct, and by the time they finally decide to act on it, they don’t cry about it –  took me six fuckin’ years to realize the streets were safer... I didn't just grow up on the streets, kid. I was raised by ‘em.”

Morty nodded in silent shock at the ease that he had just received information about his grandfather. He soaked in the story of Rick’s experiences that had never before been shared with him.

“...After so many years like that, you just kind of go crazy. I felt like I’d lost my fuckin’ mind – stabbed, shot at – watched too many people I liked and didn't like die, and one day something just snapped and I was fuckin' tired of it, so I started trying to OD. I stopped fighting – wanted to either get caught or die.”

Rick took a long drag of his cigarette before pulling into the parking space of the diner they had visited the night before. He cut the engine and brought a foot up to rest on the seat, leaning his cigarette arm across his knee. He reached out like a cat and batted the dice hanging from his mirror.

“It was a gamble. A roll of the dice. I got busted before I could OD. Tried as an adult. The man sent me to prison for a year, and I got my shit together – Then I wished I had a longer sentence cause I didn't wanna be released. I knew I was going right back to the streets, and my first night out – after I fuckin’ told myself I wouldn’t, I scored some drugs with the intent to play Russian roulette all over again.”

Rick paused and stared listlessly out the front of the van.

“...I ran into a stranger who wanted to trade my score for ‘ _his_ ’ guitar. It was fuckin' beautiful, Morty, and I knew it was hot as hell because I’d fenced shit for years. It was worth wa~y fuckin’ more than the drugs I had, but the dude was desperate for a fix. He played a few chords for me to show that it worked and…”

Rick trailed off, taking another drag from his cigarette before looking to Morty with a soft smile, his eyes glistening under the sunlight as his thoughts stirred with memories.   

“I dunno… I’ve never been able to figure that moment out. The second I heard the sound – It felt cosmic. Like I was connected to the universe, and it was more like the guitar had found me, and from that moment on, I knew I was going to learn everything I could about that guitar and I named it _la Parca_. _”_

“What's that mean?”

“That it was a turning point for me.”

Morty could have never imagined how important a guitar had been to his grandfather. He hugged the case more tightly as he understood how meaningful it must have been to Rick, to be able to teach his grandson how to play. Rick glanced at Morty becoming emotional and decided to wrap up the moment.  

“Like I said, loneliness and boredom are your real enemies. The desire to learn how to play kept me going at one of the lowest points in my life, and having something to do all day, for the most part, kept me clean when I inevitably ended up back on the streets. I was able to make a legal living, and eventually hitchhiked my way out to the bay for the summer of love with the hippies, where I came across Stella.”

“How long did you use for?” Morty asked the question, caught up in the story before quickly backtracking. “Fuck, sorry, I shouldn’t ask you shit like that – that’s really personal.” Rick sidestepped the question with a broad answer.

“A lot of people are gonna tell you drugs are the only thing that make the streets – life – tolerable, but if you're at that point, you've already given up. Drugs are too easily found on the streets, and the danger is that they are so fuckin’ practical to use here. Sometimes you can't sleep and need to keep walking else the police will pick you up, so you use uppers to stay awake. Sometimes it's too cold and the only way to feel warm enough to sleep is with downers. People even do drugs out here just so they have a fuckin’ schedule.”

Morty considered how much his grandfather had drank, and wondered if he ever thought to himself that he had given up.

“What was your practical reason?” Morty pried, unable to resist understanding more deeply what had become a defining piece of his grandfathers’ identity. Morty had never understood Rick’s motivations for substance abuse, and never thought he would.

“Loneliness.” He answered with a shrug and tossed the butt of his cigarette out the window. “When you can’t trust others, they’re sometimes the only thing you have that can make you feel less alone… make you feel safe. The danger is when you start to _escape_ into the usage – At that point, it’s easier to keep using than to go through a detox on the street. Those are the users you wanna be afraid of – the crazy unpredictable junkies who are desperate to stay high.”

“Do you still… use?” Morty was trying to wrap his head around all the things that Rick had just said. Throughout his entire story, however, he hadn’t once said he was currently clean.  

“...Once you start using, you’re always a user, kid, doesn't matter how long in between relapses you’ve been. I get to feel like I’m in control of the use and that’s the best I can ever hope to be – learning how to use without becoming addicted.”

With each question, Morty was waiting for an emotional landmine to explode. He paused for a moment, waiting for Rick’s entire demeanor to change as he struck the wrong nerve, but he continued to test his luck.

“When did you start using?”

“On my own? Right after I ran away and stopped eating.”

Morty was silent for a long moment as the words _on my own_ ran through his head on a loop, bringing up so many more questions that Morty had absolutely no right to ask. Rick didn’t like the line of questioning and decided to change the subject.

“Anyways, the point of all that honest bullshit wrapped up in a personal anecdote is that you can't give up on the streets. The second you let yourself get accustomed to it, then it becomes your life, and that's what the _Day in The Life Tour_ in Stella is trying to show you… While you're getting your shit together, I’m gonna teach you how to be streetwise so you never get in so deep that giving up is a better option than fighting to survive.”

Morty nodded, glad for the change of topic as they climbed out of Stella and made their way into the small seaside diner to find a table. Morty picked the same corner booth they had sat in the night before, and excitedly looked around the space, enjoying the daytime imagery full of motion and busy people, one pair even smoking at their table. He caught Rick watching him just as he had been the night before and blushed as he remembered the shameless flirtations. Today, however, he dared to timidly flirt back.  

“So, uh, what are some of the things you’d like teach me?”

Rick leaned forward with both hands on the table and slid the spice shakers out of the way with his forearm.

“First rule? Always keep your essentials on your person.”  

Rick reached into his pocket to reveal the large clip of bills that Morty had stored in his duffel bag. Before leaving his own timeline, Morty had borrowed Rick’s grifting machine to print out a large stack of 1970’s themed franklins. He’d been working fast and wasn’t sure how much he had printed, but he guessed it was a few thousand. Morty frowned at Rick, trying to figure out when Rick had pickpocketed his bag, before making a grab for the clip. Rick effortlessly lifted it out of his reach with his long arms.   

“Second rule?”

He unclipped the stack and without counting it out, cut it neatly in half.  

“Nothing's free.”

“Wait, Rick, I’m confused.” Morty snorted, half-heartedly reaching again for what was left of his money. There was no point in trying to get all of it back, and Morty had already internally resigned himself to the thought of being lucky enough Rick was giving him back anything at all, but he wasn’t going to give it up without a quip. “Was that payment for your life story or for rent?”

Rick caught Morty’s playful gaze and his face broke into a childish smile. He clipped, then tossed the stack of the bills to Morty, who failed to catch it and ended up having to dig around to find where the clip had landed beneath the table. He found the clip and looked up just in time to catch the motion of Ricks hand sliding over his crotch.   

“Mmm Baby! Take your time down there!”

Rick moaned loud enough for the surrounding tables to hear, and Morty quickly jumped beneath the table, hitting his head on its underside before swearing loudly to Rick’s boisterous laugh.  Rubbing his head, the brunette pulled himself back above the laminate to find Rick hiding his smile behind a clear glass of water.

“It’s payment for my services,” Rick added another shit eating grin as the waitress approached them.

“I'll treat.”

 

***

 

“There’s nothing people love more than being serenaded by sweet summer music on the beach, kid. Even if you’re just making up riffs as you go, they’ll eat it up!” 

An uncontainable laugh pulled from the back of Morty’s throat as he listened to Rick talk about making money as a busker in a way that almost certainly sounded like con. He paused, realizing that it was the first time he'd earnestly laughed like that since arriving in this timeline. It was a nice feeling. It must have been the beach. 

Morty sat on the concrete inset that divided the sand of the San Francisco beachfront from the boardwalk. He opened Rick’s guitar case, pulling out a beautiful Gibson brand acoustic guitar, careful not to drop it. The body caught the light of the sun with a blinding vibrancy, and after hearing its story, Morty tenderly cradled the guitar as if he were holding onto an extension of Rick’s existence. Even without a single note being played, the object resonated with so many memories and emotions. Morty continued to examine it, awestruck at being allowed to touch something so important to the person he loved. 

Rick had allowed Morty to borrow it to see if he could actually pass as a busker, and as they locked up Stella and trekked their way into the Wharf, Rick had called it a _perfect fuckin’ beach day to busk._ When they arrived at the sandy shores, Rick teased Morty for his excitement as he pointed out the clusters of sea lions sunbathing in the distance. _Stop acting like a fuckin’ tourist, kid!_  

Rick waved a few dollar bills in front of Morty's eyes, before dropping them into the open guitar case – the first living he’d made out of his new life.   

“It’s called priming the pump,” Rick explained as he stepped back and folded his arms with a grin. “Well, kid, go ahead. Show me what you got.” 

Morty cradled the acoustic guitar to his chest, wondering what song he should play for the man who was challenging him with a familiar, playful expression that gave away his interest. – _Go on, impress me. –_ Most of the songs that Morty knew from memory wouldn’t exist for another half-century, and Morty considered if it would be okay to play any of them instead of improvising. His eyes glanced around the Wharf at his audience of strangers. Their attentions were being drawn to much more interesting things than himself. 

“I uh… I’ve never really played for strangers like this…” 

He apprehensively tested the harmonic tuning of the strings by ear, stalling for time while he fought to regain control of his nerves. 

“Then don’t play for them.” 

Morty looked up at Rick, who watched him with the same excitement that Morty had earlier watched the sea lions. Rick thought he was about to see something novel. 

“Play something for me.” 

“For you?” Morty echoed, as the thought of playing a song _just for Rick_ made him even more nervous. He glanced out over the sea, thinking how strange it felt to visit _Earth’s_ ocean. He had rarely ever traveled Earth with his grandfather, and being here, with his younger version, felt like it was an entirely new adventure. Morty blushed as he turned his gaze toward Rick with a contented romantic sigh. This might be the start of the adventure of a lifetime. 

Morty closed his eyes and listened to the sounds of the ocean waves, the sea lions, and the background chatter of strangers and gulls. He felt the sun kiss his skin with warmth before the ocean wind gently teased it away. Life had slowed down and the quiet moment just felt... right. He felt so sure that this moment was exactly where he was meant to be. Morty breathed deep, taking in the rare feeling of a perfect summer’s day lazily enjoyed with Rick Sanchez, and his chest glowed in the warmth of the moment, filled to the brim with emotion. He knew what song he would play for Rick. It was the first song he’d ever learned to play – the first song Rick had taught him. It was perfect for this moment.

He smiled wide at the thrill of how perfect it really was. He took a deep breath, and began plucking the syncopated rhythm of the heart strings that had been vivaciously vibrating within him since he woke.   

 

_This is the first day of my life_  
_Swear I was born right in the doorway_  
_I went out in the rain, suddenly everything changed  
__They're spreading blankets on the beach_  

 _Yours was the first face that I saw_  
_I think I was blind before I met you_  
_I don't know where I am, I don't know where I've been  
__But I know where I want to go_  

Morty gave a quick glance to Rick, who had frozen at hearing Morty’s voice. Morty knew he sounded decent. After all, he’d often played and sung for Rick in his original dimension, who wouldn't have listened if it wasn't worth listening to. A few people slowed their pace as they passed by the pair, and Morty tried his best to keep his thoughts on the music.   

 _And so I'd thought I'd let you know_  
_That these things take forever,_  
_I especially am slow_  
_But I realized that need you  
__And I wondered if I could come home_  

Although he had taught Morty everything he knew, the first _real_ thing that Rick had ever taught him was how to play the guitar, and according to his younger self, it had been one of the most important skills he acquired in his life. It made so much more sense why he’d insisted Morty learn the instrument after his failed suicide attempt. He wanted to ensure that Morty would never have to struggle in life in the same ways that his younger self had, and being able to teach his grandson how to survive in a world with or without him was how he had expressed his love. 

If that wasn’t love, Morty didn’t know what was. 

 _I remember the time you drove all night_  
_Just to meet me in the morning_  
_And I thought it was strange, you said everything changed  
__You felt as if you just woke up_  

Morty swelled with gratitude for being able to come to this world and meet Rick’s younger self. Without him, Morty would have never known how much that moment had truly meant, nor understood his grandfather in a way he never thought possible. 

 _This is the first day of my life_  
_I'm glad I didn't die before I met you_  
_But now I don't care, I could go anywhere with you  
__And I'd probably be happy_  

Morty felt his voice overflow with emotion as he sang. If he had followed through with taking his life, he would have never had the chance to be in this moment with Rick, now. 

This day, the first day in this dimension, was truly the first day of their life. 

 _So if you wanna be with me_  
_With these things there's no telling_  
_We just have to wait and see_  
_But I'd rather be working for a paycheck  
_ _Than waiting to win the lottery_

 _Besides, maybe this time is different  
__I mean, I really think you like me_  

Morty dared a nervous, flirtatious grin as he held his hazel eyes against Rick’s vibrantly shimmering blues to sing the final lines of his song, before returning his gaze to his hands, slowing his playing as the song came to an end. He let the last few notes ring out before glancing back to Rick and tossing him a tender smile, proud of himself. 

The few strangers who had stopped to listen began to clap in appreciation and place money in the open case. Morty caught his breath, happy to have played through the song without messing it up. Rick remained frozen in place, looking as if he had just been punched in the gut, his mouth slightly ajar, lost in his thoughts as he continued to stare at the young adult. He quickly recovered when he caught Morty’s gaze and grinned wide.   

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were trying to sweep me off my feet with that song.” 

Morty blushed and averted his gaze, running a hand behind his neck while attentively holding onto Rick’s guitar with his other. Rick hadn’t been entirely wrong in the assumption. After all, music was the language of love.   

“I uh, just wanted to play something special for...y’know, for this moment.” 

Rick’s expression softened. He lightly tapped his boot against the guitar case.

“You're cute, kid. I like what you got – works in your favor. People are gonna fall in love with you if you busk. Make an honest living, and milk it for everything you can. 

“Did you fall in love with me? Just now?” 

Morty teased. He wasn't foreign to the concept of flirting, and Rick’s personality _had_ been slightly contagious. Rick’s eyes glinted for a moment before he reached down to pick a pile of money out of the case, displaying it to Morty with a grin. 

“Heh, love doesn't exist, kid… If someone offers you things like happiness and love, take it from them until they have none left to give.” 

Morty frowned. Those were the kind of thoughts that had turned his grandfather into the asshole he had known. Rick, in turn, frowned at Morty’s disapproving expression.

“Sorry, Morty, road kids like you can’t afford love on the streets.” 

Rick leaned forward with a sly smile, pressed his lips onto the rim of Morty’s ear and whispered. 

“But I’m gonna show you who can.”

 

***

 

“I don't think I'm... I don't know if I wanna lose my virginity to a –”

“Your call, Morty, but your virginity is over-fuckin-rated. When it comes to a sexual relationship, having experience is _wa~y_ fuckin’ better.”

“Was your first time –”

“–My first time _tonight_ is the only time I’d even think about sharing.”

Morty had recently turned sixteen, and was still a virgin. He didn't really mind, after all, the person he was sexually attracted to seemed to always exist an arm's length out of reach, and over the past few weeks, that teasing distance had become a perfect storm of awkward sexual scenarios playing out between them. The teen cringed at even the slightest remembrance. He wasn’t entirely sure when he had begun to imagine his hands fisting that unmistakable blue hair during a fantasy more than the usual redhead at his school, but it had been a gradual transition that went largely unnoticed to Morty until the day the undeniable thought that he was sexually attracted to his grandfather comprehensively, stubbornly, and irreversibly settled into his mind. Because of course he was.

From that moment of self-actualization, he was completely obvious to his grandfather, and they both knew it. Morty suspected that Rick had known even before he had, and at first, the teen was worried that he would judge him, but the scientist was never one to care about any boner but his own, and hadn’t once said anything that would induce feelings of shame surrounding Morty’s secret. He did, however, dismiss a number of embarrassing situations with teasing jokes to Morty about the teen's uncontrollable puberty boners, framing it as something natural that was to be expected.

Morty purchased a few sex toys online, and acquired some revealing porn habits. Google had become his best friend as he searched the internet to make sense of it all before even thinking about seriously talking to his grandfather about it. Ultimately the teen’s conclusion was that he held intense sexual attractions to people with whom he shared an emotional bond with – and he was maybe also a masochist – but he needed to focus on one thing at a time.

Morty had been able to confide in his grandfather about his desire to self-harm, and the experience had given the teen the confidence to approach his grandfather about his taboo desire for him, at least without fear of judgement. Rick had done far more morally questionable things in his life than his grandson, but Morty still was afraid of rejection. After he had sorted out his thoughts on it, preparing to be able to talk about them, and after he was certain that it wasn’t just a fantasy he wanted to indulge in but an experience he wanted to share with his grandfather, he nervously stepped into the garage with tactless flair to ask if _they could talk_.

They both knew what Morty wanted to talk about.

Rick dodged _the talk_ with a bullshit excuse for a few days, before calling Morty into the garage one night, surprisingly more sober than Morty had seen him in a while, to voice his regret about commandeering Morty's teenage years by dragging him on adventures – at a time when he should have been chasing healthy sexual relationships in school. He rose from his work desk and made his way to the ship, announcing that he was heading out to the Carina Arm of the Milky Way for a much needed vacation, and casually threw out an invitation to his grandson, asking him if he _wanted to have sex._ Morty quickly rose, dry swallowed and, while blushing a deep red, nodded furiously. He ran to the ship, nearly stumbling over himself to climb into the seat before Rick could change his mind.

It wasn't until they were breaking Earth's atmosphere and Rick elbowed the sweaty-palmed teen while listing the various kinds of lifeforms his grandson could choose to get off with, that Morty realized he had interpreted Rick's question in the worst possible way.

Morty was imagining Rick would take him to one of the shitty intergalactic hotels that they often got high in together, but he was fairly certain this was the same alien spa they had already visited _together_ on a vacation – after that adventure of getting that plasma shard from the princess in the Abadango cluster. He shuddered at the unpleasant memory. Morty had never seen his grandfather closer to a nervous breakdown.

_“That w... T-This was insane! That was pure luck. I was not in control of that situation at all... Look at this, Morty. Look at my fucking hand. Look at this shit.”_

_“Why do you...keep doing this to us?”_

_“I don’t know, Morty. Maybe I hate myself, maybe I think I deserve to die. I-I-I-I don’t- I don’t know!”_

“If you want my opinion, you should get a Mutant,” his grandfather offered with a sly smile, pulling Morty from his memories of the previous events that had brought them to the spa.  

“A Mutant? Like in _X-Men?”_

“Yeah, I guess they are like that blue bombshell in the comics, i-if she also had Professor X’s powers. They’re genderless, telepathic, and use organic matter as a blueprint. They’re pretty common out here, cause they’re a genetically mutating organism that can change their physical form, and they need to continually shapeshift or they lose the ability as they age.”  

“Rick, why would you go to an alien brothel, only for an alien that can turn into a human?”

“Oh no, you’ve got it all wrong kid – human sex can only get so kinky, and fucking anything that resembles a human is pretty much vanilla for me at this point. I’m paying for something else entirely, but since _you’re_ the planetary-virgin here…” Rick pointed a finger into Morty’s chest, “I think _you_ should start with a bit more of a vanilla lifeform.”

Morty nodded and looked out the window, a bit ashamed at Rick’s overt insistence that he didn’t want something vanilla like a human. The brunette wouldn't have minded sharing something vanilla with his grandfather.

“I uh, guess being a hooker out here isn’t as taboo as it is on Earth, huh?”

Morty danced around _the talk_ he wanted to have using vaguely related ideas. Rick either didn’t pick up on Morty’s use of the word _taboo_ , or wilfully ignored it as he continued the conversation.  

“Alien prostitution is a lot more egalitarian than Earth, Morty, and they sell a lot more than sex. There are as many reasons lifeforms sell sexual pleasure as there are lifeforms who buy it, but ultimately, most aliens get into the intergalactic trade because they’re entering into mutually symbiotic relationships that serve a multitude of purposes. Sometimes, the exchange involves sexual pleasure for the alien, and sometimes it doesn't, but symbiosis shapes the social and economic environments surrounding the intergalactic industry all the same.”

Morty perked up to listen to his grandfather explain the alien equivalent of the sex industry, and its machinations. It was interesting to think of the alien spas having formed out of a collective shared necessity.  

“Humans are fetishized because we’re pretty rare out here – we’re primarily in the exchange for the sex – and because most of this star system recognizes us as a primitive, but still sentient species; engaging in consensual symbiosis is important for a large majority of them.”

“Consensual symbiosis.” Morty repeated the word with an amused smile. It wasn’t just sexual actions that were being agreed on between life forms, but consent being given for a multitude of biologically serving actions that changed depending on the needs of each individual lifeform.    

“Most of the more vanilla aliens just feed on emotions, exchange body fluids to strengthen their own systems, eat your dead skin cells, lay some eggs, put some bacteria in your large intestine to get it back later… Anyways, both parties usually pay the spa establishment to find a symbiotic match, or they’ll have a roster of escorts you can hire. At the edge of some of the more sketchy star systems aliens will still sell symbiosis, but at that point they’re selling to literally survive instead of thrive... So, I mean, it’s not perfect either, but compared to Earth, it’s fuckin’ light years ahead.”  

“– Hey!” Morty joked, “Tinder and Grindr are doing their best, okay?”

Finally, the older man let out a snort, and the teen smiled in relief, happy for the break in the unspoken tension. He considered the Earth hookup apps and compared them to the idea of the spa.   

“Even with aliens, I uh, I always thought you could. I dunno, you seem pretty skilled, Rick.” Morty blushed before deciding to get to the point. “I mean. I didn’t think you’d ever need to buy a hooker.”

“Sex worker,” Rick corrected as they climbed out of the spaceship. “And I don’t, but I'm here for something extremely specific that you can’t get out of a one night Grindr stand or even in a loving relationship.”

Morty rolled his eyes at his grandfather’s less than subtle, but nonetheless still vague, rejections about his grandson’s sexual attraction toward him.

“Yeah, but, couldn't you just use a Mr. Meeseeks, for a specific request like that?”

“ _Use_ is the operative word in that statement, Morty. A Meeseeks is a bit of a consensual dilemma. I wanna at least know I'm entering into a mutually consenting agreement – Besides, they can't handle complex requests.”

“So what kind of alien _do_ you hook up with?” Morty hadn’t realized he was asking his grandfather for his type until after the question fell out of his mouth. His blush darkened as his grandfather gave him an answer.

“Usually a Mempurgare, a starspawn from Cosmos Redshift 7 – mostly known across the cosmia as _the old ones_.”

Rick wiggled his fingers at the name before continuing, “Tentacle’s are pretty vanilla when it comes to the multiverse, but what can I say.” He let out a sultry chuckle. “It’s a classic kink of mine – and they have a thing for humans... lo~ve my blue hair... They started that whole Call of Cthulhu shit on Earth back in the 20’s.”

Morty stopped walking to look at Rick as his jaw fell open. He glanced both ways before speaking in a hushed tone, “You came here to _fuck Cthulhu!?”_

The inexperienced teen suddenly felt like Rick was right. The blue haired scientist fucking something like Cthulhu felt way out of Morty’s league, and establishing that was likely Rick’s intent in sharing the information with his grandson.

“Wait, Rick. I-if it’s symbiosis and you get tentacle sex, what the fuck does Cthulhu get from _you_?”

“I’m getting more than just sex out of it, Morty,” Rick scoffed, before defensively launching into a scientific explanation of what the alien did, knowing most of it would pass over Morty’s head.

“It’s a mindfuck. Mempurgare send electrical currents through your hair to get into your head, and manipulate electrical brain synapses to trigger memories in your frontal cortex to feed off of the neurotransmitter chemicals your limbic system starts ejaculating. The geometry gets all weird and you start hallucinating while you’re riding their tentacles until you don’t know what’s fucking real.”

Morty cringed at the thought. That didn’t sound like a pleasant sexual experience, but Morty wasn’t intending to kinkshame his grandfather, since Rick had repeatedly told him he was here for this very specific service, and had been willing to share the details with him. It definitely didn’t sound like a vanilla kind of symbiosis.

“I dunno, Rick, that sounds less mutually symbiotic and more… Aw jeez.”

“Eh, it’s edgeplay, more of a consensually parasitic kind of an exchange, but still mutually symbiotic where it counts.” Rick dismissively waved a hand at him, as if Morty wouldn’t understand even if the scientist had tried to explain it. “Short of playing Russian roulette with some hard fuckin’ drugs, re-experiencing a human memory is the best way to light up your brain, and because I wanna re-do some of my greatest hits, they take me through the clusterfuck of sexual experiences I’ve gained over the years. It’s like every orgasm I’ve ever had, combined into one saliva inducing compound fuck. It’s a euphoric fucking ride.”

Morty sighed. There was no way he could compete with something like that, and he knew Rick was trying to abstractly communicate exactly that thought. His grandfather, satisfied with Morty’s wilted expression of resignation, changed the subject as they made their way to the front desk.

“Anyways, being a virgin is overrated. Especially when you’re at the best day spa in the galaxy. Experience is where it’s at, and trust me – you should get a Mutant.”

Rick looked at Morty for an answer as they stood in line. His lips pursed for a moment before glancing to the side and adding. “But if you don’t want to, there’s a no-sex symbiosis spa package – like the last time we were here. Remember that alien that likes to swallow stressed out creatures?”

“Okay. I–I’ll try it. The Mutant.” Morty trusted Rick’s suggestion.   

Rick leaned over the counter, greeted, and cordially spoke in another language to the alien-clerk before they both switched to English to include Morty, or rather, Rick extended the radius of his translating device to include him – Morty was never sure how it worked.  

“I’m on file, the usual for me. It’s my grandson’s first time and I’m recommending a Mutant – might not be his thing, but I have a strong feeling about it, and I’m paying, so...”   

The Alien desk worker looked at Morty as Rick slid a petri dish across the counter with his currency card.

“If he doesn't like the sample, let him browse the list of other donors, and if he bails entirely, just give him the no-sex day spa package.” He turned to Morty and reached out to squeeze his shoulder.  

“Okay Morty, you’re all set. Safeword’s ‘macaroni’.” He winked, before giving him a slap on the back as if to wish him luck.

Morty was led into a fair sized relaxation room, soothing smells wafted into the room from a series of large holes in the wall. There was a small hot tub in the room’s center, surrounded by a variety of...furniture? He would have never considered that this spa had been some sort of an intergalactic brothel when he first visited with Rick. It was a weird experience, having been here before with his grandfather – not for sex, just to relax together, and enjoy time in each other’s company. He supposed that was a kind of symbiosis in it’s own way, even if it hadn’t been sexual.

A gaseous cloud with a liquid mass swirling around in its center entered the room. It reminded Morty of Fart, but it was slightly different. A gentle prickling entered Morty’s mind and he thought of the petri dish Rick had handed to the front desk worker. Morty turned to notice it on a stand a few feet away. When he looked at it, he received another mental image of inserting the organic material into the liquid-like center of the cloud. He nervously swallowed, walking over to the glass dish. Resting inside were a few strands of unmistakable shimmering blue hair.

Morty’s hands began to shake as he put together the situation he had found himself in. His grandfather had bought an alien prostitute for him, _knowing_ it would shapeshift into him.

He nervously pressed the strands of hair against the liquid, just as he had seen himself do in his mind's eye, and the hair glinted before dissolving as the gas retreated into the liquid and a form began to take shape around it. Within a few seconds, his naked grandfather was standing in front of him, leaning against the pillar and brushing a hand through his hair.

Morty examined the body as a fierce blush rose up to his ears. It even had the same scars. It looked at him, and Morty felt a prickle in his mind as he imagined what his grandfather would say. The lifeform spoke his imaginings verbatim, bringing them to life.

“Like what you see? D-don’t act like it's your first time staring at me... little creep.”    

“Uh… Oh Jeez.” Morty looked away, not knowing what to say to the naked presence standing before him. The image had left his mind completely blank for a few moments, before reeling back to life with the understanding that _Rick wanted_ him to do this. Arousal stirred in his lower abdomen as he considered that his grandfather had given him consent to shamelessly fuck a genetic copy of him. He licked his lips before chewing them in hesitation.

The mutant walked toward Morty and cupped his face before leaning down to kiss his forehead, and there was so much tenderness in the gesture that it made Morty’s knees weak and his erection harden. But it wasn’t Rick.  

“Y-you’re not him.”

He blushed, looking into his grandfather’s face. His normally luminescent blue eyes were dull, and Morty wanted the lifeform to also admit it, that he could never be Rick. Not-Rick released Morty and walked over to what the teen assumed was a bed to sit down, before silently patting the surface next to him. Morty followed, lowering himself on the edge of the bed, and the Mutant spoke in Rick’s voice.   

“I’m everything but his mind, Morty, and to recreate that, I emulate his actions based on how you think of him, but at the end of the day, I’m just a good fukin’ counterfeit that gives you exactly what you want.”

Morty swallowed. It was terrifying how accurate the response was. It was exactly the kind of way Morty thought Rick would have answered. He sighed at the admission. _Everything but his mind._  

That was what Morty loved most about him.

Rick had given Morty permission to have a _mimic_ of himself, but not the real thing. The thought angrily burned in his chest because it felt like even more of a rejection. It was a rejection that had taken a lot of effort, and the effort demonstrated how much Rick cared about him. Rick was trying to help Morty address his sexual desire of him, without being willing to fully acknowledge or reciprocate it, let alone _talk_ with him about it.

That wasn’t the kind of consent he wanted from his grandfather. This was a purely physical consent.

Morty wanted an emotional kind of consent with Rick. Sure, his fantasies involved his grandfather fucking his familial blood relation with a complete disregard for taboo or societal rules. They involved sloppy drunk kisses, unending praise, a sense of danger and trust. But all of those physical and emotional things he had found sexually attractive were a reflection of the person who Morty loved, and the relationship they already shared. Morty wanted _Rick_ , _his_ _mind,_ to acknowledge those things and make love to him in an act _of_ acknowledging them.

As he worked through his emotions, he felt them being shared with the Mutant-Rick sitting in the room beside him. Morty wondered if that was what he got out of it: swirling teenage emotions. The lifeform chuckled before answering, still in character, reading this thoughts.

“That’s part of it, kid, but we usually prefer when they’re positive.”

The Mutant leaned into Morty, and pulled his ear against his lips. A hand rested on his thigh with a light squeeze, and Morty felt the entire naked presence next to his clothed one and still felt more exposed.

“You sure you don’t want this, baby? I’ll take good care of you.”

Morty palmed his erection through his jeans as he carefully considered it. He wouldn’t mind getting off, and _would_ prefer if he could take care of the now aching throb in his jeans. That wasn’t the issue that had his stomach currently tangled in knots.

If he was going to have this adventure with Rick, He wanted _Rick_ to be the one to share the experience with him.

“I-I’m sorry,” Morty apologized, pulling away from the Mutant and rubbing a hand behind his neck. “I don’t think I can…  not with Ri – you.”

The Mutant-Rick pulled his hand from Morty’s thigh, pursing his lips for a moment, considering the situation.

“I-I’ve been listening to your thoughts and I have an idea, can we try something else?”

He hesitated for a moment, but nodded towards the alien, giving it his trust. As long as it didn’t involve his grandfather, he’d be willing to give it a try. The Rick moved behind Morty on the bed and leaned into him, giving him a hug before plucking one of Morty’s hairs and tossing it into his mouth.

A series of disturbing crunching sounds followed and Morty tightly shut his eyes as he felt the Mutant’s skin shift while it held onto him from behind. It felt like marbles rolling around beneath the naked, fleshy surface, and Morty shuddered, suspecting that the lifeform had moved behind him to prevent the teen from witnessing the nightmare fuel of watching his grandfather reassemble into something else. The motion stilled and allowed Morty time to mentally adjust before motioning for Morty to turn. He was looking at himself.  

“Better?” it asked with a confident smile.

Morty was still for a long moment as he looked at himself, considering if it _was_ better. This would mentally feel more like a form of masturbation than anything, and it really did feel like a pleasant way to explore his first time. He smiled in relief before nervously nodding to the Mutant. While he mentally felt ready, he remained extremely nervous about having sex for the first time, even while knowing his thoughts were being read. An array of nervous questions and thoughts rose into his mind about what he should do. The Mutant reflected his emotions of relief before pulling Morty into a warm embrace, and the teen found himself returning it, offering a quiet word of thanks to the lifeform for understanding and helping him find something he was comfortable with, and wanting to share the experience with him. The Mutant pulled away with a soft smile and held Morty’s face in his hands.  

“I’ll lead,” it offered, reading his thoughts, and Morty shyly nodded in agreement as his heart began to race, bursting again in nervousness and gratefulness to the lifeform. His doppelganger pulled Morty into a kiss, lingering on the sensation, before pulling him further onto the bed.

At first, it felt strange to think of the action of kissing himself, but as he pressed back into his lips to deepen the sensation, feeling the lifeform respond – informed by Morty’s own thoughts – it became an interaction of physical and emotional self-affirming love. The lifeform had given him an experience of self. It made eye contact, bringing their foreheads together with a smile and it’s voice unapologetically and without hesitation spoke to him.

“I love you.”

Morty couldn’t refute the raw statement which the Mutant had reflected, honestly and vulnerably, from deep within Morty’s being, and hearing himself express such a thing in such an undeniable way was emotionally powerful. It moved him so fully that the only response he could communicate was a tear-choked whisper of thanks. He was truly grateful for being able to experience such a moment with his self, and to share it with someone who wanted to share it with him.

“Your existence is beautiful.”

The doppelganger spoke in his own voice, and removed Morty’s shirt, kissing his torso, before reaching out and kissing the scars littering his body. Morty had been nervous and shy at first, but the lifeform had created an intimate atmosphere between them, where he felt safe and comfortable with himself, without fear of his own judgement.

Morty knew the lifeform needed his emotions and selflessly gave of them, wanting to express how meaningful the moment was for him. He let the lifeform into his heart and mind, and in return it gave back, sharing with the teen all the things he had desperately needed to share with himself. _Morty’s_ mind acknowledged self-love, and in turn the teen physically expressed that to the lifeform, sharing an emotional experience of the relationship he had with himself, while shedding tears of a powerful cathartic release. The lifeform had given him such a beautiful gift, to be comforted and held by a tangible representation of the most loving parts of himself. To physically being able to embrace and make love to them. They switched positions, and dominance, and eventually the lifeform introduced Morty to very light masochism, after the teen had been willing to share the thoughts he was still confused and ashamed about.  

“Your existence is beautiful. T-thank you, for sharing it with me.”

Morty blushed when he kissed his own lips as they parted, and was left staring into the lifeform’s unique eyes. He shyly thought that he would love to see it again if he ever had the chance, knowing it would hear his thoughts. He received a stream of mental images of the things they could explore together next and grew flustered, feeling his ears burn.       

As he returned to the lobby, Morty began to understand what Rick had been saying about looking for and needing something very specific. He walked away from his first sexual experience with a few bitemarks and bruises, picturesque mental images of what _he_ looked like riding out an orgasm, and what _he_ looked like, perfectly debauched and spent, but most importantly, he left the experience with a better understanding of himself. Morty hadn’t known how much he needed that specific experience until it had happened, and although he was saddened that his first time had not been with his grandfather, the experience had been so satisfying that he didn’t regret a single moment of it.      

He met up with Rick back in the lobby and was flashed a knowing grin. The teen was still attracted to his grandfather, and his face burned in embarrassment at the thought of Rick _knowing_ he was no longer a virgin. He avoided eye contact and silently followed the scientist back to the ship, grateful that he hadn’t teasingly pressed him about the details of his encounter.  

Morty leaned against the window, drawing lines between the distant stars as they made their way back to Earth. He wanted to ask his grandfather so many things in an attempt to try and understand why Rick had gone to such great lengths in helping Morty address his incestual desire, but had still been unwilling to have even the smallest conversation about it.

His grandfather had been mostly silent since they had reunited. He seemed relaxed, but catatonically so. His whole presence was distant, and he had been staring off into the distance of space, deep in thought since they had left the alien spa. Morty wasn’t sure if it was the best time to try talking with him, but it was a few hours before they’d arrive back at Earth, so he decided to test his luck with the captive audience.

“Uh, hey Rick?” Morty reached out and turned the volume down on the interdimensional radio. Rick, pulled from this thoughts, looked at the gesture, then to his grandson with a guarded frown of caution.  

“I just wanted to uh… tell you. It was nice of you, to offer your hair for that Mutant back there. But I didn’t –”

“–Don’t sweat it, Morty, I had to pay a extra for the second form, but i-it’s all good. I’m just glad you had a good first time – you little narcissist.”   

Morty was silent for a few moments, before taking a deep breath and getting to the point.

“We don’t have to talk about it, but I just… I just wanna know what you think...about me wanting you like that?”

“Look – I’ve told you, it’s not anything weird, Morty. You spend all your time with me – wires get crossed. It happens.” Rick began a practiced explanation of how normal Morty’s sexual attraction to him was, but the teen cut him off. His experience with the mutant had helped him understand that what he wanted from Rick was valid, and it had given him newfound confidence to verbalize it to him.

“– That’s not what I mean, Rick, I don’t think you get it… It’s not just something physical...for me.”

Morty was irritated because Rick had to know this already. The teen thought it was evasive and weird that his grandfather was willing to pay for a prostitute version of himself to sleep with his grandson before being willing to acknowledge, to his face, that it was what Morty physically and emotionally wanted from him.

“I’m not kinkshaming any of your fantasies, Morty–”

“–No, Rick – Jeez, that’s not – that’s not what I mean!” Morty’s voice grew frustrated as he recognized his grandfather’s attempts to redirect the conversational focus back on him. It was one of Rick’s bad habits of deflection, and the teen knew it meant he didn’t want to talk about it, but he continued to press the conversation, looking for answers.

“I _know_ that’s not what you mean, Morty,” his grandfather spat out, before releasing a heavy sigh, cutting the bullshit. “I don’t _want_ _you_ in the same way you _want_ _me_ , so you’re gonna fuckin’ drop it.”

“But why–”

“–Morty!” Rick finally snapped, silencing the teen without so much as glancing his way. “This is the only answer I’m giving you: I don't _owe_ you an explanation.”

Morty folded his arms in a huff and leaned into the back of his seat, reassured in his decision to not sleep with the Mutant-Rick. His desire for what he really wanted was all but confirmed in his grandfather’s denial of it. Rick would probably never be willing to give him an explanation. He hadn’t even been willing to fucking try. Morty bitterly stared out at the stars, wishing he could get into his head and understand why, but even that seemed like it would be too much for his grandfather to give. His thought drifted to the Cthulhu alien, wondering the kind of consent his grandfather had been willing to give to it.

“I just wish you’d let me in.”

 

***

 

“The miners came in forty-nine, the whores in fifty-one; when they got together, they produced the native son. – A little history lesson about the gold rush, kid, and the Bay’s complicated history with prostitution.”

“What's that smell?”

“The public restroom.”

Rick cycled from walking forwards and backwards down the sidewalk with his hands in his pockets, explaining to Morty as his eyes scanned the streets.

They had walked and taken a cable car from the Wharf because Rick had informed Morty driving Stella in Tenderloin was too sketchy. They rounded a corner and it was as if they had entered into an entirely different neighborhood. Clusters of homeless were scattered down the street, and stray pieces of clothing and garbage littered the sidewalks.  

“Won't find any gentle people here, kid. Tenderloin’s full of hard drugs and harder people, and once you hit rock bottom, the universe’ll throw down everything it has to keep you here – stay close.”

Morty’s pace slowed as he looked around; Rick turned while still walking backwards and told him to keep moving.

“Stop looking around like you’ve never walked down a street before, kid, it’s drawing all the wrong kind of attention.”  

“Are you still trying to scare me into going home?”

“No. I believed what you told me this morning, but I was faking it out to baldy back at the piss palace because he has some great ideas in mind for you that involve either selling you to a trafficker for a quick fix, or working this very street so you can fund his habit. – Fuckers like him are one of the reasons I return strays...but you’re not a stray and you paid me to show you the ropes. There are other ways to hook in the Bay, but if you’re like most of the homeless, likely all you have is Tenderloin, Union Square, or Ashbury.”

Rick casually stopped in front of a set of stairs to sit, and as Morty moved to follow, Rick pulled him between his legs and lowered him onto the step in front of him. Morty’s heart began to race as Rick caged him between long spindly legs and leaned into Morty’s back, sliding arms over his shoulders and down onto his chest, before crossing them to hold him in place. Morty nervously swallowed and stiffened at the contact, reminding himself that Rick was just trying to make them less noticeable, but Morty jumped against Rick’s body when a low voice spoke in his ear at a register that only he could hear. It chuckled knowingly, and Morty’s face burned red.

“We’re gonna people-watch for a bit, Morty... I brought you here to give you an honest look at hooking off the street. I wanna keep you from being tempted away from busking by a few more dollar signs.” Rick’s cheek pressed against Morty’s to slightly turn his head, nudging him to glance to the right.

“The woman in a brown dress, she’s working. A prostitute, hooker, gear-shifter – whatever you wanna call it – don’t stare. Linger too long and I’m gonna distract you.”

Morty stole a quick glance to the woman before watching her out of his peripherals. She was wearing white gogo boots and chatting with a few other women and men against the side of a building.

“How do you–”

“–Empty coke bottle. That’s the signal for most of the Bay that you're selling in the area – kind of redundant on this street if you ask me, but whatever... A curb crawler’ll pull up and ask if she wants a ride. Money up front before she opens the door, and if she’s smart she’ll scan the car to see if he’s packing heat before getting in.”

Morty watched as a vehicle pulled up to the side of the street and the woman approached the passenger's side and leaned into the window.

“Streets like this, the car usually rounds the block. She’ll give ‘em around 15 minutes. After that, they start to look obvious to the fuzz. Her friends probably know that if she’s gone more than 30, something's wrong.”

The woman and the man talked for a minute before her hand fell into the car and she looked around, before waving to her friends and opening the door. Rick pinched Morty’s arm before tightening his grip as the brunette swore and jumped against him at the sudden pain. Rick let out a teasing hum, and laughed in his ear, pulling the brunette further into his chest.

“You were staring.”    

Rick moved his head to the other side of Morty and used his arms to steer the young adult's focus towards the other end of the street. More groups of women and men were standing together.

“Is it safer to do this with friends?”

“The best friend girls have out here is the pill. But if you have someone you can trust to watch your back while you’re out turning tricks, then it can make hooking a whole lot easier.” Rick smoothed his hand across Morty’s chest and batted away his jacket while purring into his ear. Morty took a deep breath, trying to blend in as Rick continued to feel him up, pressing the metal ball of his tongue piercing against the rim of his ear. He swallowed, hard, and held the deep breath, regretting that he had agreed to this. This street was the _last_ place he wanted to have an involuntary erection. The metal ball of his Rick’s peircing flicked against his ear before speaking.

“Drug deals ten o’clock.”

Two women, one with bare feet and the other a bit older, were making quick exchanges with a man leaning against the door of his vehicle. Morty nervously glanced before quickly looking away, not wanting to feel Rick’s body tighten against his after being pinched again. He had a suspicion that Rick had enjoyed it a little too much, and Morty thought it was pretty tasteless to flirt in such a way on a street like this.

"Like drugs, sex is part of homelessness. Not everyone’s gonna get involved with drugs. Not everyone’s gonna get involved with sex. But for a lot of people those often become the two key ingredients to survival on the street. You have to learn how to use without becoming addicted.”

Morty glanced down onto the sidewalk in front of him, deciding it was the only safe direction in which to stare. Rick pulled him close again, sliding his hand up Morty’s neck to tilt his gaze back upwards, before hissing into his ear. “You’re being fuckin’ obvious, kid. The idea was to make it look like you just bought your first hooker, and are too scared to do shit... Mmm, my favorite.”  

“Rick! You –”

Morty motioned to twist in an attempt to look at Rick, whose arms tightened around him, holding the brunette in place and keeping him from blowing their cover. Rick pressed a hand into the side of Morty’s face and pressed his lips against his ear.   

“The streets have gotten way too hot in the last few years. It wasn’t on this street, but I was a chicken hustlin’ one exactly like it, and I’m _really_ _fuckin’_ glad I’m not selling off the streets anymore.”

“Wait, Rick, you _still_ do…this?”

It had been different to imagine unnamed people selling their bodies on the streets. But it was much harder to apply everything Rick had been telling him about prostitution to the body sitting behind him. That must have been why he was so upset the night before, when Morty had insinuated that Rick was expecting Morty to put out for a place to sleep. Rick interrupted his burning thoughts.

“I’m gonna pull you up on my lap, and when you turn to face me  – the boy on the other side of the stairwell we passed coming in.”

Rick relaxed his grip, allowing Morty to casually turn his body so that he sat perpendicular to him. Morty pulled his knee up to his chest and Rick leaned into him, dipping his head underneath Morty’s arm and wrapping hands around his waist to lift him up onto his thigh. Morty blushed, then glared at the feeling of Rick’s fingers brushing against his abdomen, convinced the slip of skin had been intentional. Morty settled onto Rick’s leg, and just over the stairs was a teenage boy in a plain shirt, a jacket and jeans, hugging his knees. He was sitting against the wall with another man who was rubbing his back as his body shook in a series of small tremors, and the young adult’s heart sank as realized the boy was crying, much in the same way Morty had been this morning. He looked away to allow him the privacy, turning to face Rick. He followed by example, and leaned into Rick’s ear to whisper his thoughts into it.

“He can’t be older than 14…” Morty thought of the age that he was when Rick first came into his life.

“And?” Rick spoke back in dismissal, “A lot of young kids working the streets… Some, like yours truly, are younger than that when they they start.”

They made eye contact, and Rick wrapped his arms around Morty’s waist, lowering him into a hug before speaking into his ear once more in a quiet whisper.  

“He could just be hard-timing, but there isn't a way to safely hook, kid. Just because you're selling your body doesn't mean you won't get raped, robbed, or beaten while working. It’s _especially_ true if you’re hooking off the streets. Working for a pimp isn’t much better...the only reason I’m probably still alive is ‘cause I got away from streets like this one.”

Rick pressed his forehead into the nape of Morty’s neck, avoiding eye contact as he spoke into the brunette’s chest, hugging him close so that Morty couldn’t see him.

“If you're regularly hooking, it’ll regularly happen. It sounds like terrible advice but when it does, let it happen – fighting back only makes it more dangerous, and you're only gonna get hurt more, or worse, killed.”

_“You cry because the universe hasn't fucked you over enough that you can still think it gives a shit about you. Trust me Morty, you're gonna hit that point in life, like the rest of us, where you realize that nobody owes you shit, and crying isn't gonna help…”_

Morty considered the stories of experience Rick had shared with him throughout the day, and wondered at what point in his life his grandfather had stopped crying. The first time he’d ever seen his grandfather shed tears had only been a few weeks ago, after Morty had asked for too much of him. He wrapped his arms around Rick in a hug, as if to apologize. They were silent for a long moment.

“I wanna leave. I don’t like people-watching on this street.”

“C’mon, let’s get out of here.”

Rick pressed a hand into Morty’s thigh and gave it a pat before instructing him to stand up and start walking in the direction they came from. Morty rose and Rick followed close behind.

As they were leaving the street, Morty made eye contact with a stranger approaching them from the opposite direction, and instantly regretted it when they started catcalling him, closing the distance between them.

Morty slowed his pace with the intent to apologize, but Rick sharply bumped into Morty’s arm, before stepping in between them and continuing to walk.

“Don’t talk, and keep on truckin’, kid.”   

The young adult followed Rick’s lead and they ignored the stranger as they passed by him. He became erratic and began to walk after the pair, shouting after Morty.

“What! You think you're fuckin’ better than me!”

Rick sped up their pace and by the time they rounded the corner at the end of the street, the stranger had stopped following them. After they were a fair distance away and had made their way back to the trolley stop Morty breathed a sigh of relief, lowering himself onto the bench and wrapping his arms around his chest. Rick joined him, tossing a foot across his knee, with his hands still in the pockets of his bomber jacket.

“What the fuck was that?”  

Rick shrugged as he motioned to pull out a cigarette. It bobbed between his lips as he spoke. “You made eye contact and he was either crazy, high or just marking his fuckin’ territory… Maybe all of the above – Streets don’t have a lot of clear answers, kid.”

Rick lit his cigarette as Morty continued to take deep, calming breaths. He had dealt with various threatening lifeforms across a number of alien planets with Rick, and he wasn’t exactly sure how such a normal human encounter could make his heart pound in his chest like it had. Even while he had been bullied at school, Rick had never bothered to teach him how to deal with humans, let alone the threatening kind.

It had never occurred to Morty, how little his grandfather had actually cared to interact with the inhabitants of Earth, and he thought that his preferences for sleeping with and forming relationships with alien lifeforms over humans had likely been influenced by Rick’s experiences on Earth. Rick released a stream of smoke into the sky and leaned his head back.

“Everyday you're gonna feel threatened in some way, kid. You gotta get to the point of picking out which threats are the ones you pay attention to.”

“Okay, but – I was really fucking paying attention to him.”

“Not escalating it, and walking away, was the best way out of that one, trust me, – you empty your pockets from the beach yet?”   

Morty patted his pockets. His lighter, and all the money he had made at the beach were gone. His heart dropped as he quickly looked at Rick with a panicked expression, who smirked, reaching into his own pocket, and returned the small roll of bills. Morty frowned, internally relieved as he snatched the money back, wishing his jacket had zippered pockets after the second time being pickpocketed while wholly unaware. He glowered, thinking of his unreturned lighter. It had to have been some sort of lesson Rick was trying to teach.

“What?” Rick defensively joked at Morty’s unthankful expression “I picked it in case something happened. You didn't wanna have that much cash on you if anything _had_ escalated.”

Earlier, they had stopped at Stella to lock up the guitar, and if Rick had been worried about Morty's safety he would have reminded him to leave his money with the rest of the large bills in the secret compartment beneath the rug – just as they had done after they left the diner. Maybe Rick had been waiting for Morty to think of doing it on his own.

“Why’d you even bring me there, Rick? Do you really think I’d choose to work on that street?”

“People who “choose” to work that street don’t have much choice in the matter, kid. My goal was to pull a _Dante’s Inferno_ through homeless hell to keep you motivated to do everything you can to stay right where you’re at on the homeless spectrum, which is just barely.”

Morty looked at Rick, frustration slowly subsiding. Rick had just wanted to show Morty what the worst case scenario looked like. He wasn’t trying to scare Morty into going home, just trying to scare Morty away from ending up on that street. It wasn’t his fault that Morty was getting emotional over being revealed so many things that his older self had never wanted to share with him, and for a moment, Morty felt like he had done something wrong. He felt like he had disregarded what his grandfather had wanted, which was for Morty to never know any of this.

“It’s just... Fuck. That street seems so far away from where you are, Rick. It’s just… It’s just hard to imagine you were ever in a place where something like that was your only option.”

Morty worked through his emotions as he shared his thoughts with the younger version of his grandfather.

Rick had always done exactly what he wanted, and was rarely out of control in any situation. It was so hard to imagine that his grandfather had ever been whoring himself out in the gutter of the universe against his own volition. The understanding made him more human, and having to acknowledge that hurt when he thought of him as something exceptional.

“I was in a place where I needed the money, and that scenario’s a lot closer than you think. If you let the universe take the reins, you’re gonna end up as its bottom bitch.”

“So, why do you still choose to be a sex worker, now?”

“Sex worker...” Rick mused over the terminology. “Hm, I like it. That sounds closer to the type of stuff _I’m_ doing, but sex slavery is probably a more accurate description for people working that street.”

The newfound knowledge that his grandfather was a prostitute was burning itself into an array of memories, and with every new piece of information he learned, it was accompanied by the cutting insistence that his grandfather never trusted, or wanted his grandson to know about it. This Rick had no reason to hide such information from Morty, and was just trying to give him information that would help him survive. His older self had never wanted Morty to even think about surviving in such a way.

“There are different kinds of prostitution kid. A call-boy and a street whore both sell similar products, but that's where the similarity ends. You can call it whatever you want, but I call what I’m doing a symbiotic exchange – a transaction. I trade myself to money and drugs by choice now. I get to choose who I see, what I charge, what my rules are, where and when I work...”

Morty nodded at the straightforward, unapologetic answer. Rick propped his elbows against the back of the bench, gazing up at the cloudless blue sky.

“Working solo comes with its own risks, but when it comes down to it, I can suck the metaphorical dick of “the man”, busk for a few hours and maybe break a hundred, or I can make an honest transaction riding cock in a warm hotel, take a shower, and slip some continental breakfast and soap while I’m at it for hundreds more.”

“...You’re selling a specific experience, not just sex.” Morty summarized, thinking of the reasons why his grandfather hired alien prostitutes. Rick nodded in agreement.

“At that level, hooking’s not about the money – I mean, of course for me it always is – but they’re usually looking for a very specific service that they can’t find elsewhere. Sometimes, it’s more than just sex – like some kinky fuckin’ shit, or some sort of amoral coping, and other times, I’m being paid to offer an emotional connection just as much as a physical one.”

“It’s a physical language.”

Morty leaned into the bench behind him, considering the ideas Rick had shared.

“Sure, and that’s why I said illiterate road kids like you can’t afford love on the streets. Hookers understand the cost of confusing sexual and emotional needs with survival.”

Morty rolled his eyes. He didn't like when Rick handed out advice he didn't, himself, take. It felt condescending, and frustrated the young adult to no end. He was frustrated with his grandfather. He was frustrated with Rick. He was frustrated about the entire adventure on this street. He crossed his arms.

“I don’t like that neighborhood.”

Rick chuckled at Morty’s pouting and shrugged, before rising to his feet as the cable car approached their stop. His eyes glinted as he looked at Morty with a youthful grin and ran fingers through the tresses of his hair. Their colors caught the light of the summer’s day and danced with life. He pointed to his skull.

“The most dangerous neighborhood’s the one in your head.”

 

***

 

“Hey Rick, whenever we go on adventures and I get hurt, you treat the wounds, but you always leave the scar.”

“Is that some sort of rhetorical statement, Morty? Because I'm not following.”

They were in the subterranean lab, while Rick conducted a scheduled medical evaluation on the both of them. Interdimensional planetary travel carried its own risks, especially for organic lifeforms, and routine screenings were as boring as they were necessary. The late-teen sat in his boxers, and stared at the scars on his legs, remembering the time he had been pushed from the roof. Those should have been the only _real_ scars on his body, because they were one of the few wounds that Rick had chosen not to heal. The rest of his scars were from wounds that Rick _had_ healed, he'd just made the decision to leave the scar tissue in place.

“Have you ever catalogued your scars?”

Morty leaned back on the medical chair and shamelessly watched his shirtless grandfather work, taking in the tapestry of scars that wove themselves across the older man’s skin. Rick walked over to him and shrugged, continuing to work. He pinched Morty’s cheeks and stuck a thermometer into his grandson's ear for a temperature reading.

“It’d be a waste of my time cause they all still burn in my mind. I remember getting almost every one of these babys, Morty. Scars mean you’ve survived something – that you were stronger than what left them... It’s hard to forget that shit.”

“What about this one?” Morty pointed to an angry keloid scar that had long ago faded, though the tissue still remained raised. Rick hadn’t even needed to glance down to know the scar Morty was speaking of.

“Switchblade,” he hesitantly offered, before quickly adding, “a-at an age way younger than anyone should be getting scars like that.” The scientist rolled a swab over Morty’s forehead and tossed the material into a jar for later analysis.

“What the fuck happened?”

“Some shit I'm glad you're never gonna have to see in your life, kid.”

Rick slapped a sticker onto the teen’s chest and pulled up a variety of readings on the screen next to them. Morty continued to casually converse with his grandfather while he tried to interpret the data.

“Must be a good story if you didn't wanna answer my question.”

Rick reached over and unsympathetically ripped off the sticker, causing Morty to hiss in pain.

“Let’s take a moment to praise your observational skills – but you still don't know when to take a fuckin' hint, Morty – I'm not going to.”

“Have you ever thought of getting rid of them? I mean, it's probably not hard for you to figure it out.”  

His grandfather waved a dismissive hand at him before gathering the materials to draw blood. Morty was bored, and couldn’t help being a distraction to Rick with his questions. The scientist let out an irritated sigh.

“It’s a cosmetic waste of time, Morty. Even if you get rid of the scar, you can't erase the experience – that's why lifeforms, especially the ones who wanna get inside your head – dig scars. They tell way better stories than the fuckin' tattoos your generation’s into.”

“Have you ever wanted to erase an experience?”

Rick stilled, contemplating in silence for a moment, before walking to the other end of the lab to reveal a white gun-shaped device from a permanently shelved box of drunken outlet projects. He tossed it on the table next to Morty.

“It’s is a lot more complicated than that, Morty. If you wanna wipe memories, you'd have to dissolve a shit ton of neural structures from your hippocampus and frontal lobe, because memories aren't singular. Your consciousness functions like a quantum computer and the network of structures in your limbic system are impossible to fully untangle. A single memory is entrenched, linked to a million other things: other memories, senses, thoughts, emotions.”

Rick held a finger gun to Morty’s head and pulled the figurative trigger. Morty swallowed, forgetting to listen to Rick’s lecture, and instead indulged in the new memory for his spank bank of how attractive his shirtless grandfather had just looked.

“...and if you start breaking down those declarative memory pathways, you're creating neurobiological abnormalities. At best, you're basically giving yourself early onset Alzheimer's, and at worst you're emulating the memory deficit effects of PTSD – You wouldn't be able to entirely erase an experience without irreparably damaging your sense of self, because all of your experiences are interwoven in the fabric of your identity.”  

Morty picked up the device and examined it. After hearing Rick's explanation, it felt more like his grandfather had just revealed to him a suicide gun.

“There’s a lot of shit in my life that I wish had never happened, Morty, but for better or for worse, it made me who I am. It defined the complex structures behind these blue eyes.”   

“So why’d you make a uh, a memory gun?”

“I was really fuckin’ drunk, and it doesn't fully erase a memory, just induces a self-created deficit by heightening the perceived stress of an experience until your brain's self-preservation mechanisms kick in and it does the work of forgetting for you.”

“So it works like Cthulhu?”

“Still jealous about that?” Rick smirked at Morty’s revealing reference before reaching out to ruffle his hair with a tease. “Don’t be. Those redshift aliens force you to _remember_ some of the most stressful experiences you’ve lived through to give your brain a raging hard-on... if you forget after the fact, it’s your own mind re-creating the deficits.”

Rick plucked the device from Morty's fingers and tossed it back into the box of abandoned projects. Morty considered the Mempurgare, who Rick had at one point defined as sharing a consensually parasitic relationship. The information he had just been given… It felt like Rick had just shared something important with him.  

“Why –”

“–I deactivated it after I considered using it on you. Kind of a mindblowing dilemma if you ask me. Wanting to shelter you from unpleasant realities by triggering a PTSD-like response in your brain...”

Morty forgot his question as his stomach sank in consideration of the numerous dark implications contained within a single statement. Rick had likely said it to steer the conversation away from the question that had been falling out of his mouth.  

“Would you ever…on me?” Morty's stomach tied itself in knots as he asked the question, not fully sure if he wanted an answer. He knew how dark Rick’s thoughts could get, but wanted to believe that Rick wouldn’t erase his memory unless it was something Morty had asked for.

“I _could_ _try_ to control how you see me, Morty, but I _can't_ protect you from the universe forever – whatever it’s gonna throw at you... Even if you wanted me to.”

Rick held upward-facing palms against his torso in a demonstrative gesture, presenting a lifetime of experience. Even as Rick changed physical bodies and gave himself cybernetic augmentations, he had recreated or retained them, like a physical journal written on his skin.

“One day, you’re gonna have to go on an adventure without me, and all I can do is believe that I’ve given you everything it takes to walk out of it with fewer of these babys.”

Rick reached out to grab Morty's arm, and examined it with a melancholic frown, running a pair of fingers over a few of the scars he felt directly responsible for. He kissed his fingers and pressed the digits into the most recent one made by Morty's own hand, and the late-teen looked away from him.

“Every figurative and literal scar you have is gonna make you into the person you’re gonna be, Morty, and I’m not gonna try’n change a thing about it… even if it means that you grow to hate me – The only job I'm concerned with is teaching you how to pack a punch.”

Rick took Morty's fingers and rolled them into a solid fist, holding his grasp around it, before continuing. “But you're gonna be the one who has to throw it.” He patted the fist with a smile, before looking at Morty like he was about to do something exceptionally well.

“You’re gonna make me fuckin’ proud as hell when that day comes, Morty, even if I’m not there with you to see it.”

“Of course you’ll be...” Morty softly defended, taken aback at the statement that had been spoken with so much painful wistfulness that it caused the brunette’s heart to race in alarm.

Rick’s blue eyes shimmered, alive in that beautifully complex way, before his tender smile faded into something more pained. He remained reticent about the experiences that Morty had yet to learn, and reached out to ruffle the boy’s hair, taking his time. His expression took on a nostalgic weight as he pulled back, pausing to study the late-teen, seemingly comparing his own memories of Morty to the current reality before him.  

“I've made my peace with it, Morty. If I erased your experiences, then you’d always need me – With every lesson I teach you, you’re gonna need me less, and if I’ve done my job – if I've done _one_ fucking thing in the entire universe right... Then there’s gonna come a day when you won’t need me anymore.”

 

***

 

_Beneath the stains of time, the feelings disappear  
_ _You are someone else, I am still right here_

 _What have I become my sweetest friend_ _  
_ _Everyone I know goes away in the end_

 _And you could have it all – my empire of dirt_ _  
_ _I will let you down… I will make you hurt_

 _If I could start again. A million miles away_ _  
_ _I would keep myself, I would find a way…_

Morty played the instrumental notes of the song without singing the lyrics. But he was deep in thought as he considered the words passing through his mind, and what they had meant to his grandfather – why he had listened to this song the night Morty had attempted suicide.

Today, Morty had considered something for the first time. That moment might have been a turning point for his grandfather as much as it had been for him. Afterward, Rick had wanted to learn everything he could about Morty, maybe even as much as Morty wanted to learn about him.

Rick believed in his grandson long before Morty had ever believed in himself.  

Rick had believed in Morty more than Rick ever believed in himself.

_“I’m so fuckin’ glad I got to watch you become your own person, Morty. You’re gonna be so much better than me – Fuck, you already are better than me. E-even though you’ve dealt with so much, Morty, you’re still a good kid – a good kid with a heart of gold, and just knowing that– Just knowing that... I at least did one thing right and I’m so proud of you, Morty, so fuckin’ proud of you.”_

Rick’s drunk words were often his sober thoughts, and the familiar, depressed, drunk that he had known had belligerently stumbled into Morty’s room that night because he wanted to share them –

“–Has anyone ever told you that you act like an old man?"

Morty was pulled into his current reality, realizing that he had been staring at the sunset, absently playing out the heavy thoughts weighing on his mind. He laughed at the absurdity of such a statement.

"You're the first…” He offered a smile tinged with a hint of sadness as he continued to strum the notes. “Sorry, I was thinking."

"Yeah, I do that too, but I don't get that 70-year-old look in my eyes of having forgotten who the fuck I was for a moment.".

Morty sat against the open door of Stella, and stared into the distance for a few more moments

“Your real name... It means ‘King’…” He thought aloud as he continued to play the instrumental notes of the song. Rick snorted at the sudden change of topic, kicking the ground before propping himself against the metallic embrace of Stella.

“Pfft, king of a pile of fuckin’ dirt.”

He took a long drag of the cigarette, and settled in to listen to Morty's music. Morty hadn’t been aware of how much being homeless involved long stretches of uninterrupted time. Earlier, the way time had seemed to slow down felt liberating, but now it filled Morty with too many thoughts, and they were beginning to weigh on him. He wondered if a constant stream of adventures allowed his grandfather to keep busy in a similar way. Morty had been playing Rick’s guitar just to keep his mind occupied.  

“You’re better than me... You put your whole self into it,” the youth passively commented, and Morty painfully smiled, accepting the praise. Rick wouldn’t have said something like that if he didn’t truly believe it.

Morty transitioned the song into an improvisation in the same key. Notes and chords in A minor rang out across the beachfront, adding Morty's own voice to a song about Rick knowingly and voluntarily throwing his life away.

Rick had driven Stella closer to Land’s End and pulled the van up against the beach where they could watch the sun set against the Golden Gate Bridge. Earlier, Morty had mentioned to the younger version if his grandfather that he had always wanted to see it, if he ever got the chance, and Rick had given it to him, claiming he knew _the best spot in the Bay_ to go.

“But you’re thinking too much, kid.” Rick commented and Morty sighed in agreement.

“Can we get some ice cream on the way h-...wherever we’re going tonight?” He spoke the suggestion on a spontaneous nostalgic whim, eager to do anything but sit and watch the sunset alone with his thoughts. Rick teased the childlike request.

“Sure, Morty, but only if you admit that ice cream is for 70-year-old senior citizens romanticizing the 40’s.”

Morty was appreciative of this Rick's ability to so easily read him, and effortlessly intervene with humor to pull the young adult from the dark thoughts swirling in his mind. Rick smiled at Morty's reaction, flicking the ash from his cigarette.

“How about we stay here tonight? We’ll use the morning tide pools to wash up.”

“Don’t you wanna go back to the no-home club?”

“No, because even if no one wants to hear it, that house is being watched. And I don’t want you to get attached to anyone in there, kid. Chances are you don't really know ‘em and if they don’t backstab you – they won't be here within the year. Most of ‘em are gonna bounce the west coast. Some are gonna get picked up. Some disappear. Some are gonna fry their brain on drugs – And the strays go back to their good homes after touring a day in the life.”

“What about MJ?”

“MJ is gonna martyr herself for something she believes in more than her own life.” Rick bitterly growled out the statement and tossed his cigarette butt to the ground. It was clear that Rick didn't agree with MJ’s choices, and he was angry about being unable to change them.

“Is that why you’re not together?”  

Rick scoffed at Morty's question, the irritation in his voice growing. “No one’s _going around_ out here kid, we all live in the moment, and don’t think about tomorrow. We just try to make each moment last.”

Morty stopped playing and looked to Rick with an accusing glare.

“That's what you were planning to do with me...last night in the van.”

Rick frowned at having his shit called and swore, before looking away from Morty and staring across the orange glow of the California sunset.

“Morty, that’s not what I meant  – look around! What? D-did you expect a fuckin’ rose garden or something? It doesn't matter. _We_ don't matter to anyone... How little you really matter to anyone is the hardest part.”

“– And that’s why you were going to…” Morty caught himself on the words. He didn’t want to ask Rick about something he hadn't wanted to talk about. Rick didn’t owe Morty an explanation.

“Look, kid. You can't look at a single action and pick one fuckin’ event that influenced it. A lifetime of influences led to that moment where you stopped me from jumping.”

Morty nodded in understanding. Rick had felt this way for most of his life, _about_ most of his life experiences.   

“...but, I’m glad that you stopped me, more than I’m angry that you stopped me.”

A heavy, mutually understood silence followed Rick's honest admission. The young adult wondered if that was what his grandfather, the Rick in his original dimension, might have said.

But Morty hadn't been there to stop him.

If Morty didn’t allow himself to laugh, he would have cried.  

He laughed at the absurdity of it all. He was the polar opposite of this Rick. Glad his grandfather _had_ pushed him from the rooftop, more than he was angry that he hadn't tried to stop him. All of the strange differences and connections felt like a cruel inside joke that he alone shared with universe. Rick glanced to Morty’s out of place laugher with concerned side-eyes as the young-adult looked over to him. He motioned to pass the guitar to Rick, inviting him to play. Morty wanted to listen to his grandfather, even if every note would sharply travel through him.   

“...Does that mean we’re at least friends?”

Rick didn’t take the guitar, but instead climbed past him into Stella and kicked off his shoes. He opened the small refrigerator and pulled out two popsicles.

“Wouldn't know. I’ve never made one.”

 

***

 

The radio had always been something that had comfortably filled the spaces between them, but tonight, Morty was glad to let it fill the awkward, uncomfortable silence of the evening spent with a familiar stranger as they prepared to retire for the night.

 

_I want to live, I want to give_  
_I've been a miner for a heart of gold_  
_It's these expressions I never give_  
_That keep me searchin' for a heart of gold  
__And I'm getting old_  

A low whistle interrupted the awkward silence. 

“You’ve got some sweet fuckin' battle scars, kid!” 

Morty had been changing into a clean shirt to sleep in, and glanced at his bare abdomen before shyly covering it with fabric. He often forgot about his scars until someone pointed them out and reminded him of their existence. Morty never considered his scars having come from any sort of “battle”, let alone a life threatening situation. He had trusted his grandfather, and if anything, they were simply reminders of his acquired taste for pain that adventures with Rick had helped to satisfy. 

Morty stole a glance at the shirtless, younger version of this grandfather. The scar he had pointed out in memory was still there, and still looked faded, though less so. Morty stilled, frowning as he more closely examined it on the younger’s body. Rick had said it was from when he was young, but Morty was now wondering at exactly what age he had acquired it. He reached out, and lightly brushed his fingers over the tissue. Rick jumped for a moment at the touch, before allowing him to continue to feel the angry narratives of the raised flesh. He watched the brunette in silence, and Morty knew he was showing too much emotion behind the gesture. 

“When did you..?” Morty began, but stopped himself, imagining the same response his grandfather had given. Even if he wanted to know, it wasn’t his business to ask. 

“The night I ran away from home.” 

His grandfather must have seen something beautiful within the flawed, overcompensated healing of his scars, or at least something human within the ugly narratives of their unapologetic imperfection. He could have changed anything about the person he thought he was – how he presented himself to the universe – but he hadn’t. He embraced the whole of this own flawed self, and allowed Morty to do the same. 

Rick placed a hand against Morty’s chest and pushed him back onto the mattress, staring down at him with a piercing gaze. 

“Take off your shirt.” 

Rick wanted to see the full extent of the brunette’s scars. Morty blushed for a moment, before looking away and pulling the shirt over his head. His heart pounded in his chest, and his breath hitched as Rick watched him undress, then stared at the display of Morty’s body in quiet contemplation. Rick moved closer, towering over him in the small space as his eyes darted across his body. A few burning moments passed before Rick silently pointed to the scar on the underside of Morty’s forearm. It was the most recent, and Morty wondered if Rick could tell from looking alone. He was asking the young adult to share his most recent experience, and Morty turned his head further away in shame and stalled. 

“Do you want an honest answer or bullshit?”

 “I want what you wanna give me.” 

Morty covered the scar with his other hand and continued to look away from Rick. The situation that had caused arousal only moments before now made Morty feel vulnerable and exposed beneath Rick’s gaze. His grandfather had known about Morty’s self-harm slip-ups, and Morty wasn't proud of himself when his grandfather knowingly stared at them, but admitting them to the face of _this_ version of him, after the man had shared so many of his own life experiences, was much harder. He knew they weren't – but Morty’s own experiences, which had led him to self-harm, seemed almost trivial in comparison.   

“I uh, cut myself with a piece of glass. Drank too much… I do that sometimes.” 

“Drink too much?” 

“No...hurt myself.” 

Rick frowned as he picked up Morty’s arm to examine it more closely. His brow furrowed.   

“Why?”  

Morty shrugged, not wanting to give him an answer, but revealing one nonetheless with his roundabout, deflective response. 

“I don’t get _why_ I matter so much to you.” It had been something weighing on Morty’s mind. Rick was right earlier when he talked about how little people mattered. He had no reason to take Morty under his wing. Morty _wasn’t_ anyone special. He _shouldn’t_ matter to Rick. Even before Rick had taken half of his money to have an excuse for looking out for him. He shouldn’t have mattered to anyone in this dimension.

Rick kissed his fingers before silently pressing them into the scar on Morty’s forearm, and although this recent scar was different from the one in his memory, the similar gesture sent shivers up Morty’s spine, and his flesh burned against the memory of the familiar touch. 

“I’ve never met anyone who’s cried for me like that.” 

Morty noticed pair of symmetrical bruises that had spread across the sides of Rick's torso. It took a few moments before Morty realized that they were from him. He rose his hand to rest over one of the purplish spots, and allowed his thumb to caress the bruised skin. 

“I'm sorry... I didn’t mean to hold on so tight.” If Rick had been ready to die, he hadn’t shown any signs of it from the moment Morty had stopped him. But his grandfather had always hidden away so much of himself beneath the surface of those beautifully complex blue eyes. 

“Don't sweat it.” Rick’s breath had become shallow. “I gotta give it to you...you're stronger than you look.” Morty broke his gaze away from the man above him, feeling a slight blush rise to his face alongside a soft smile at the compliment. If he were, it was because of him. His hand stilled on Rick’s torso.   

“Um...tonight? I uh, I was wondering...” He began, and felt Rick’s body tense, before the blue-haired youth made eye contact with a demeanor of calculating calm. Morty swallowed considering his imaginations for a moment before he shut them down. “I don't wanna do anything, but…” He wasn’t sure how to explain that he wanted something more than physical with him, after Rick had all but told him to not confuse emotional needs with survival. 

“You don't wanna be alone.” 

The voice answered in understanding. Morty nodded before quickly adding, “It will be warmer...if we share our blankets.” Morty didn't want Rick to be alone with his thoughts tonight, and had no other way to tell him how much he mattered. 

“There are _much_ better ways to stay warm, Morty.” Rick snorted at Morty’s obvious cover-up and pulled away from him. The youth switched off the radio and the small light before tossing his blanket on the bed to join him. The van rocked with his motions as he crawled further onto the mattress, but he made no effort to flirt with the young adult as he had done the night before. He sighed with an arm raised over his head and stared at the ceiling.      

“I’m trying to figure you out kid. You're a fucking enigma.” 

Morty ignored Rick’s compliment disguised as lamentation as he arranged the blankets over them both. He settled down a couple of feet apart from Rick, before daring to slide a few inches closer. Rick sighed, before turning to his side, facing away from him, and re-establishing the small distance between them. 

“...Goodnight, Rick.” 

Rick was silent for a long moment, before letting out a sigh. “Night, Morty.”

***

 

 

 _“It’s the clearest language we have for speaking with the universe itself.”_  

Morty rose in the middle of the night to stargaze while the rest of the world slept. He lay awake on the mattress listening to the sounds of ocean waves lapping against the shore, passively watching the glow-in-the-dark stars on Stella’s ceiling, before his gaze fell out the window and he looked up toward the galaxies’ undercurrent of stars that endlessly moved above him. 

The ocean of stars reminded him of the man he loved, and for that, they would always be beautiful. 

The moment Morty had walked through the portal, he threw his first real punch. Rick had known from the beginning that he’d never see it, but had made his peace with it, knowing that if he’d done _one thing right_ , then he wouldn't have to. 

There was nothing more to be said about it. Morty’s final rite of passage was letting Rick go. Making him proud. He turned his body to face away from the person sleeping next to him. 

Making Rick proud didn’t mean Morty stopped needing him, however, and his heart ached in complex shards as he yearned across space and time, needing to feel the presence of the person he loved. In that moment, the darkness of a quiet night, he believed the universe shared its language with him. 

Its voice submerged him into a chaos of so many diffracted emotions that the only color he could feel was blue, and the shores of the cosmic ocean swelled within him like an unavoidable tide. Tears spilled from his eyes, overflowing from the depths of his being because he was too fucking full of everything. His body shook and hiccuped as he brought a hand over his mouth, trying to muffle the sound in an effort to not wake the person sleeping beside him. 

The presence on the other end of the mattress stirred, however, then stilled as Morty continued to drown, suffocating beneath his own shaky breaths as he gasped, trying to come up for air. A cold shock of wind entered under the blanket as Rick slid next to him, wrapping arms around him and pulling him into a powerful embrace. Their bodies pressed together, sharing the warmth between them. 

For someone who felt so disconnected from the universe, Rick was fluent. 

His quasi-stellar existence was also blue, born from the complexity of the universe, and he effortlessly reached across its impossible depths to shelter Morty within his protective embrace. In such a simple, wordless gesture, he spoke of empathy, safety, and reassurance, but most resoundingly his presence made Morty _feel_ that he was not alone. 

Morty shook as he heaved tears from from deep within him, and Rick pulled him closer, refusing to let go. He kept still, pretending to remain asleep so that Morty could cry, unashamed, while continuing to be held. 

Morty turned to face Rick and wrapped his arms around his torso, hugging tightly over the bruises that were undeniable proof. He held Rick as tightly as he had then, wanting the man wearing them to know that he didn’t just matter, but that Rick was the most important existence in the universe to him. Morty wished on every single star within it that Rick – his beautiful existence – would never feel alone again. That he could know how much he mattered. 

He looked up, and took in the stars that he had wished upon. 

There was an entire universe hidden within Rick’s incandescent eyes. They iridescently shimmered against the darkness of the night, alive with color, and illuminated from within. Morty stargazed into his entire being – across a cosmic ocean of entangled space and time, conversing in the clearest language he had for speaking to another existence. 

It was a meaning far too complex to be translated into three words.    

Rick pressed his cheek against Morty’s, and felt his tears as if they were his own.

 

 

 

* * *

**CHAPTER ENDNOTES CAUSE FUCK THE 5K CHARACTER LIMIT**

**SONGS**

**Planet Caravan (Black Sabbath)** : This song appeared on Black Sabbath’s 1970 breakthrough album [ Paranoid ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paranoid_\(album\)). Geezer Butler has stated that the song's meaning is floating through the universe with one's lover. I thought it was a nice thought/song to end the chapter with.  

[ **Heart of Gold:** ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Young)While containing references to the gold rush, Neil described it as the song that "put me in the middle of the road. Traveling there soon became a bore, so I headed for the ditch. A rougher ride but I saw more interesting people there."

[ **Roky Erikson (13th Floor Elevators):**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_13th_Floor_Elevators) Roky is the same age as Rick in this fic, and his band 13th Floor Elevators was one of the pioneering bands for psychedelic/acid rock. He was diagnosed with schizophrenia and received involuntary electroshock therapy. 

**COSMOLOGY**

**Superstring Theory (The Theory of Everything):** [ Stephen Hawking’s The theory of everything ](https://youtu.be/Da-2h2B4faU)is a very poetic cosmological idea that tries to define the basic, fundamental, indivisible, constituents that make up and connect everything in the universe, then, argue for an ultimate universality – That everything, across ten dimensions of space and one dimension of time is connected by the same vibrating strings of energy: matter particles, electrons and quarks, radiation particles, photons, gravitons, are all built up from one entity, which we can measure and define using our language of mathematics. Like with the soulmate discussion, this theory plays with the idea of entangled/connected Ricks along the Central Finite Curve, and purposefully leaves itself open to interpretation.  

[ **Chemical Scum** ](https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/523470-the-human-race-is-just-a-chemical-scum-on-a) **on a** [ **Pale Blue Dot** ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GO5FwsblpT8) **:** Rick is quoting both Stephen Hawking and Carl Sagan here. I _really_ love the idea of Toxic Rick representing a literal chemical scum. Even though the idea of being chemical seems pessimistic, Hawking goes on to acknowledge the unique point of reference of being a human, “But even chemical scum can understand the Universe. That makes us something very special.” A big cosmological concept in the 70’s was Carl Sagan’s [ “We Are Stardust” ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLPkpBN6bEI) or a loose idea of [ optimistic nihilism ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBRqu0YOH14) , that humans are the sensory organ of universe, and that our ability to [ recognize ourselves within it ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9D05ej8u-gU), was a defining aspect of what made us human, and an essential moment for sentience as a species.   

[ **Music Theory & Math: ** ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAxT0mRGuoY) There is a lot of overlay with music and math, and [ it’s worth checking out. ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyW5z-M2yzw) I am 100% here for using music and math to make an extended visual metaphor for superstring theory. I HC that the central finite curve takes the shape of the [ the calabi ](http://www.dummies.com/education/science/physics/string-theory-and-calabi-yau-manifolds/) , and a Rick’s interdimensional travel is capped at the 6th dimension. [ The Calabi is believed to have the same shape as a horn, ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtdE662eY_M) because vibrational energy, like vibrational sound, is believed to travel more freely in such a structure.

[ **Carl Sagan Writes about Recreational Weed:** ](http://marijuana-uses.com/mr-x/) Carl Sagan published an anonymous essay as Mr. X in 1969 for publication in _Marihuana Reconsidered_ (1971). Sagan was in his mid-thirties at that time. He continued to use cannabis for the rest of his life. Read this, then get high and look at the stars, like the greatest minds before you.

 **The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean:** Carl Sagan often referenced the [ cosmos as a cosmic ocean ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzS39oghcnY&list=PLrWLuvbMN7cC_HGCWzz4-JTsBawgdlwxc&t=0s&index=47) , and I’m just gonna keep doing that in this fic. Rick could be figuratively seen as a cosmic oceanic cyanophore, the equivalent of which would probably be like a quasi-stellar (star-like) being. [ Quasars, ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fThGKOgSo5I) the brightest blue objects in the universe, don’t fuck around.    

**SCIENCE**

**Rick Hates School:** Heres a video on [ knowledge versus thinking ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sq9ZBzKQAsM) courtesy of Neil deGrasse Tyson, that can give an [ insight to why. ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MqTOEospfo&t=0s&list=PLrWLuvbMN7cC_HGCWzz4-JTsBawgdlwxc&index=37)

[**Rick’s Blue Hair,**](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3g246c6Bv58) [**Diffraction (Interference):**](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcqZHYo7ONs) Nearly all the vibrant blues in animals and plants are created by structural coloration rather than by pigments. However, some ocean species do possess vesicles of a cyan biochrome of unknown chemical structure in cells named cyanophores. I HC that Rick’s hair, like many oceanic cyanophores, is a mixture of both structures and pigments. I HC hard that the structures of his eyes and hair follow suit with the [blue morpho butterfly](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29Ts7CsJDpg) and interact with light using light diffraction and interference. I’m also applying diffraction to the concept of superstring theory to play with the idea of Morty’s involvement in Young Rick’s life, as well as the complexity of the universe showing itself through the color blue.

[ **Survival** ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvskMHn0sqQ) **of** [ **the Fittest** ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxE1SSqbSn4) **&  ** [ **Consensually Symbiotic:** ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSmL2F1t81Q) I’m 100% applying ideas of consent and symbiosis to intergalactic, sentient, interspecific interactions, and I made up this word because it’s really fun to think of consent on a level that goes further than sex, and applies the ideas to all necessary biological actions for a variety of sentient species. It’s a whole other concept.

 **Memory Guns:** I wanted to take a stab at the [ potential science behind the device in the show ](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/how-our-brains-make-memories-14466850/) . This Rick deviates from the C-137 canon by choosing not to use the Memory Gun, however, his justification leans towards the [ Neitziean stance of Amor Fati, ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Xzh1BjCA5Q) which is still very Rick Sanchez.

[ **The Science of Scars:** ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucRMDdw82yw) Scars form because of overcompensated healing of skin cells – and that’s a damn metaphor for Rick and Morty both in this fic.   

 **Mempurgare (Cthulhu):** The Mempurgare use Rick’s blue hair to access his memory, and [ the science ](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/how-to-plug-in-your-brain-180958775/) I used for it is a good read. The Mempurgare pose the dark idea that Rick is consenting to engage in a form of consensual non-con edgeplay where he is forced to remember traumatic life experiences, of which, involve sexual assault and abuse. For Rick, being able to not forget his experiences is how he copes with them, and it offers a kind of amoral therapy for him. He's able to experience the memories in a safe, controlled environment, but essentially it is a [ forced PTSD trigger ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=343ORgL3kIc&t). He is also able to find a connection to the Cthulhu alien, who he sees like himself, as somewhat parasitic, because he trusts the parasitic mutualistic relationship over the mutually symbiotic one. In the story, it illustrates how a lifetime of fighting has created a fixation of survival that has turned Rick into a nihilistic ruthless character, even towards himself. His obsession with teaching Morty everything he knows so that he can survive is a reflection of that.

**SF & HISTORY**

[ The Vietnam Draft & Rick’s Military Habits: ](https://thevietnamwar.info/vietnam-war-draft/) Rick gets accused of skirting the draft. In this fic, Rick is 70 in 2017, and would have been in the draft. My HC is that he skirted the draft, and his obsessive military habits come from a combination of a father in the military (crotchless Uncle Sam daddy issues), and that a lot of those behaviours are very practical for a homeless person to have and use, many of which he may have picked up from returned homeless vets. In my HC, Rick’s military behaviours carry some trauma and he obsessively carries them into old age.   

 **Morty accidentally teaches Rick the term “sex worker”** , which became popular in the late 1970s, after it was invented by Scarlot Harlot, a prostitute and activist living in San Francisco. Ideas of consent, sex, and prostitution were very different in the 70’s. San Francisco, with the [ Tenderloin District ](https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/San-Francisco-s-skid-row-the-Tenderloin-rich-in-9182414.php#item-85307-tbla-5) in its heart, has a [ unique history ](http://www.foundsf.org/index.php?title=Gold-Rush_Era_Prostitutes) with [ prostitution in the US ](http://ebar.com/bartab/article.php?sec=barchive&article=84), and this fic will explore it more.

[ **“Fuck that new seat belt shit”** ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seat_belt_laws_in_the_United_States) **:** I HC that Rick has never worn his seatbelt. Ever. Also, If you are ever in San Francisco, go to [ Louis’ Diner. ](http://louissf.com/index.html/)

**POP CULTURE & OTHER**

[ **Shoutout to The Butterfly Project:** ](http://butterfly-project.tumblr.com/) Morty struggles with self-harm in this fic, and I HC that since Rick’s eyes are like the Blue Morpho butterfly’s wings, then by metaphorical extension, Rick is Morty’s butterfly. While Old Rick is more understanding of Morty’s self-harm and cutting, Young Rick is going to struggle with understanding it.  

 **Safeword’s “Macaroni”:** Nod to another one of my favorite Rick and Morty Fic’s [ “Couple’s Only” ](https://archiveofourown.org/chapters/27387099?show_comments=true) Rick and Morty pose as a couple in order for Rick to make a deal with an alien who owns a ‘Couples Only’ spa. Things get out of hand when they have to prove that their relationship is legitimate. Go give it a read!

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I included the endnotes in the chapter, I just want to use this space to say thanks for reading and subscribing! I'm so glad to see people are enjoying this story, and I'd love to hear your thoughts as the story progresses – don't be afraid to say hi and chat with me in the comments!
> 
> Check out the [ Spotify playlist I made for afterlife. ](https://open.spotify.com/user/qgd6gt9y4l98ubsslngy6a3ue/playlist/1w3op6U70gxiS1SKF2SZxX?si=ahA43a9bT8KRSL0pDcpsZQ)
> 
> Also check out the [ youtube playlist I made of](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrWLuvbMN7cC_HGCWzz4-JTsBawgdlwxc) all the theories and ideas referenced in the fic endnotes.

**Author's Note:**

> ###  Starry AU Constellation Map (Interconnected characters & fics in this AU)
> 
>       
>  [ ✦ Starry AU World building & Update Schedule](https://starry-citadel-au.neocities.org/)  
> [ **✦ The Starry AU Collection page** ](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/STARRYAU)  
> 
>   
> 
> 
> ###  Extras for the Interconnected Starry Citadel AU 
> 
>        
>  [ Rick and Morty themed Playlists on Spotify ](https://open.spotify.com/user/qgd6gt9y4l98ubsslngy6a3ue?si=7mx-Uuw0QhGcpylR_tgB9g)   
>  [ Starry AU fanart (and artist credits) on Mastadon ](https://fandom.ink/@left_handed_rick)   
>  [ YouTube playlist of theories and ideas referenced in this fic](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrWLuvbMN7cC_HGCWzz4-JTsBawgdlwxc)   
> 
>   
> 
> 
> ###  Kudos & Comments = Love 
> 
> I love kudos and comments way more than I should. If you are enjoying this story let me know, but if for whatever reason you choose not to, I still appreciate that you are reading my work.


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